


Bad Blood

by uwontfeelathing



Category: Anne of Green Gables - L. M. Montgomery, Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: Bonfires, Dinner Party, F/M, Halloween, Its Halloween in May Bitches!, Murder, Murder Mystery, Samhain, Spooky, idk what is wrong with me, no one asked for this
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:01:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23937313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uwontfeelathing/pseuds/uwontfeelathing
Summary: It is October 31, 1903, and a storm is blowing in, the likes of which the Avonlea has never seen before.Anne Shirley-Cuthbert is throwing a Celtic ritual celebration, but she never expected to be thrown into the center of a gruesome mystery that will change her life forever.Who do you trust when everyone is a suspect?
Relationships: Anne Shirley & Muriel Stacy, Diana Barry & Anne Shirley, Diana Barry/Jerry Baynard, Gilbert Blythe & Anne Shirley, Gilbert Blythe & Sebastian "Bash" Lacroix, Gilbert Blythe/Anne Shirley, Jerry Baynard & Anne Shirley, Sebastian "Bash" Lacroix/Muriel Stacy
Comments: 91
Kudos: 78





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Though this whodunnit is set near the timeline of the original show, this is an AU! These characters are not exactly the sweet, innocent Victorian-era babies we all know and love. There is INTRIGUE and MYSTERY and DEATH and SECRETS and some allusions to SEX in this universe, as well as quite a bit of interest in what - at least at the time this story is set in - was considered THE OCCULT. 
> 
> Find me on [Twitter ](https://twitter.com/uwontfeelathing) or [Tumblr ](https://tumblr.com/uwontfeelathing) to say hey or ask questions or yell at me about stuff.

The windows rattled in their panes as the wind outside picked up speed, howling through the trees and across the open fields outside of Green Gables. Inside, Anne smiled to herself, moving to arrange the bright autumn leaves loosely around three wide, white candles on the large silver platter once more. 

It was the last day of October - her favorite month of the year - and Anne’s guests were set to arrive at any moment. She thoughtfully perused the space one last time, pushing back her shoulders and stretching her tired back before standing erect, her eyes slowly roving over each intricate detail. 

She eyed the turnips hanging about the room first - into the faces of which she and Diana had lovingly carved gruesome visages before soaking them in a tub of water and vinegar, and, finally, stringing their tops with fine thread and hanging them about the room. She surveyed the collection of tall tapers arranged around the room, ready to offer a meager, flickering light to each corner of the quickly darkening space. Next her eyes fell back to the table as she tried to judge with impartiality the spread collected there: fresh-baked hand pies filled with meat and some of the root vegetables Anne had grown that year in her garden - helped along by Matthew, though none of her crop nearly as robust as his somehow - each pie bursting with carefully cultivated flavors that even Diana agreed “sang out with the very essence of fall” (but only after Anne asked her [for the third time in the span of five minutes] whether the pies were “everything good about October condensed into a single bite”); two tall piles of small cakes, filled with cream, half of them topped with spiced apples, the other with rich, blood-red jam; a long loaf of coarse, dark bread, studded through with nuts, seeds, and dried currants; and a large bowl filled with spiced red currant wine, sliced oranges floating upon its surface. 

Anne reached out to adjust the centerpiece yet again, her mind dragging itself from the precipice of her imagination, the urge to fall into daydreams of the rich food and fun awaiting her ever beckoning. She had dreamt of throwing a  _ Samhain Dumb Supper _ \- an ancient tradition which she had read about in the book on Celtic traditions she had borrowed from Diana ages ago - for years now, but this year she used everything she could think of, including a merciless and entirely unsubtle reminder that next year she would be married with a house of her own far from Avonlea, to coerce Marilla into allowing such “ungodly nonsense” to occur under her roof. Of course, it didn’t hurt matters that Marilla and Matthew had plans to be away visiting their cousin’s family in Carmody for the evening. 

The windows shook once more, the wind picking up speed as it came up against the broad face of Green Gables, which stood immoveable, forcing the ruthless wind up and over and around. Anne smiled to herself, thinking of her elaborate plans for the evening; of the rituals that would be performed, the words and rites that would be uttered, the fantastic pageantry of the ancient celebration. 

Her smile faltered momentarily, suddenly recalling the caustic and judgmental words Rachel Lynde had spat at her when Marilla had let slip Anne’s plans for the evening. Anne was used to being thought strange,  _ and  _ to being needled to the point of contemplating violence when it came to the nosy Mrs. Lynde, but she tried to shrug off the other woman’s reproach. It was true that some would be bobbing for apples or trading cakes for songs with little children on this night, or else shuttering their windows and putting out their lights early in the name of piety. Mrs. Lynde and her very public form of self-righteousness had been horrified to learn that Anne and her guests planned to solemnize this night the right way; the way long-since abandoned by those in Avonlea, who had loudly and sanctimoniously done away with the pagan celebrations of their forebearers long ago. 

Through the shuttered windows, Anne saw a dark figure move up the pathway toward Green Gables, and she shook her head to clear away the memory, while inspecting the decor once again, her hands fluttering in front of her. The long tapers sat erect upon candelabras borrowed from Orchard Slope that afternoon, an old crocheted table linen, tattered and worn, covered the low coffee table in the sitting room, and, most importantly, an overly-large pile of dried leaves, sticks, and logs lay neatly piled in the sitting room fireplace, ready for a deeply-symbolic ceremonial lighting to come. 

Anne felt her blood thrill just thinking the words  _ symbolic  _ and  _ ceremonial _ , but then, for at least the tenth time in the last hour, forced herself to swallow down the bitter disappointment she felt. The traditional fire of Samhain was meant to be an enormous, outdoor affair, but the harsh squall blowing in would not permit a bonfire, or any other outdoor rituals this year. Anne tried to content herself again, reasoning that this smaller, indoor blaze would have to do -- her imagination would simply have to provide generously when it came to the scope of the blaze. 

A light hand knocked upon the front door of Green Gables, and Anne quickly removed her apron, revealing the gauzy white dress she wore beneath - its billowy material tucked neatly in at her waist, the neck draped into a V at her chest, the sleeves loose and flowing. Anne had left her feet bare - seeing no reason to don shoes, as the plans for the outdoor portion of the evening had been spoiled. She knew that the overall effect made her seem otherworldly - more spirit than sprite, with her hair twisting loosely around her shoulders. She had even left her cheeks purposefully un-pinched, her lips unbitten, which added great effect to her ghostly pallor. 

Swinging the door wide, a smile spread across Anne’s face as she took in the first arrival. Gilbert’s dark hair was wildly wind-swept, his usual loose curls blown into waves, falling softly across his forehead. He wore his usual, fairly pedestrian outfit of slacks and a warm, dark sweater, which Anne, herself, had hand-knit for his birthday the month before. She knew that underneath he wore a white linen shirt and braces, as he always did, and she already longed for the room to grow warm and close with bodies; for the moment when she would watch him remove the sweater, suspenders stretched tight over his broad chest. She bit her bottom lip absentmindedly as she pictured it - pictured watching and wanting him from across the crowded room, already able to imagine the way her body would react - the tightening low in her belly that she would feel as she saw him strip away his outer layer. 

Gilbert was still in the open doorway of Green Gables - the wind rushing in past him, pressing hard at his back in its eagerness to finally gain entrance - as he took in Anne from top to bottom. His eyes caught on the bare toes peeking out from the hem of her long gown, and a slow, warm smile spread over his face as he completed his survey, meeting her gaze with eyes that looked pure black, almost savage, in the twilight. 

He pounced then. 

Before she could open her lips to welcome him, he was upon her, his mouth greedily stealing warmth from her lips; his fingers, cold from his walk over, grasping at her waist, gathering her to him with inexorable craving. Once her body was pressed against his, he pressed her further into the room, their lips still caught up in wordless greetings, before reaching back with one foot to kick the door closed behind himself. 

When he had backed her all of the way inside and up against the heavily laden kitchen table, he suddenly broke away from her lips. He smirked at her, his eyes dark and dancing, as he bent low, reaching to place his hands against her bare ankles, then he gathered her skirts up against his arms as he stood once more; his hands drew a firm line up her legs, stopping at her thighs where he gripped her tightly, pressing his hips into hers. He paused then, trailing kisses along her neck. 

“How long until your guests arrive, Phantom?” He was breathing hard against the soft flesh of her neck, hands moving up to grip her hips beneath her skirts, fingers splayed. Goosebumps covered Anne’s fevered skin, his lips continuing to brush across her neck as he spoke. 

“A-- any moment now,” Her breaths were ragged, too. Unconsciously, she gripped his upper arms as if to push him away from her even while her hips moved in a delicious friction against his, seeking to press him just where she suddenly needed to feel him. 

“Hmm… then I’ll have to be quick,” he murmured. She felt Gilbert’s smile against her neck as the pressure of his hands increased. As he squeezed her soft flesh with his fingers, he pressed his leg between hers, parting them gently with his knee as he did so. He began lowering himself - pressing haphazard kisses along her torso as he went - until he was kneeling in front of her, his face level with her navel. He grinned wickedly up at her as he moved his hands back to her thighs, her skirts still raised by his forearms, as he lowered his lips to press against the apex of her trembling thighs--

\--when a sharp knock sounded against the front door. 

Anne’s eyes snapped up to look at the door, relieved to find that she had drawn the curtains tight across the window there, her face flushing. The heat of her blush had spread all of the way to her ears by the time Gilbert had chuckled humorlessly against her too-sensitive skin, then pressed a firm, closed-mouth kiss on the top of each of her thighs before lowering her skirts and standing to his full height next to her once more. 

He laughed once, this time in earnest, when he saw the expression on her face, reaching out to cup her cheek, his voice breathy. “Well, at least you have some color now,” he murmured before kissing her swiftly on the cheek and turning toward the door. 

Anne stood rooted to the spot, hands spread across her belly as she slowed her breathing, while Gilbert opened the door to a smiling Sebastian Lacroix, his own brother for all intents and purposes, and his former teacher, Muriel Stacy. 

“Welcome!” Gilbert’s voice was loud and natural, and Anne was awed at the way he could change gears so swiftly; as if he were two different people. It had been that way for weeks now - since they had become engaged, it seemed as though Gilbert had unleashed a part of himself he was determined to keep hidden from her before. It came and went in their quiet moments together, and, though Anne enjoyed every stolen moment alone with her fiancé, feeling wild and overheated and brand new, she was still floored by the change in him -- fearing herself unable to keep up with his uncanny ability to snap out of the fog of lust that his animalistic physicality seemed to leave her lost within. 

“You two arrived together, eh? How  _ interesting _ ,” Gilbert’s voice was teasing as he stepped aside, gesturing the guests inside with a flourish of his arm. 

“Don’t start with me today, Blythe,” Bash warned, his eyes belying his good-natured humor though his voice was gruff. “Just remember - I know where you sleep.” 

“Yes, but where have  _ you _ been sleeping lately, my friend? I could have sworn the other day, on my way home from a particularly late call, I saw you--” Gilbert broke off with a laugh, as Bash gripped his head in a headlock, the two of them wrestling briefly before turning their scuffle into a quick hug, slapping each other’s backs loudly before they broke apart. 

Muriel ignored them, smiling warmly as she entered the house and removed her coat and scarf, surveying Anne’s handiwork around her with wide eyes. Bash broke away from Gilbert in order to take her things and hang them in the entryway as she crossed the room to greet Anne with a warm hug. 

“It looks just as I had imagined it would,” Muriel pronounced, gripping Anne’s hands tightly in both of hers as she smiled at her favorite pupil. Anne felt the compliment deeply, and her blush darkened slightly as she smiled back at her mentor. “Thank you so much for having us, Anne.” 

Bash had turned from the coat rack, his attention falling back onto Gilbert. 

“Wait a minute, Blythe. Why you still got your coat on? I didn’t see you coming up ahead of us… and why is our hostess here looking so pink about the ears? Were you two in here discussing the weather or--” Bash broke off as Gilbert punched him roughly on the arm. 

“Alright, alright.  _ Uncle _ .” Gilbert and Bash both fought smiles as they narrowed their eyes at one another, calling a silent truce on any more teasing about the status of their relationships for the time being. Bash reached out a hand, and Gilbert shook it, throwing his other arm around Bash’s shoulder and ushering him toward the kitchen, then adding in a quiet aside, as though he couldn’t quite help himself, “Speaking of  _ uncles _ , are you and Miss Stacy planning on making me another niece, or perhaps a nephew, sometime soon? Because, as I was saying, from what I saw the other night… or was it early evening…”

Bash elbowed Gilbert hard in the ribs, and both of them were soon tussling and laughing once more. The wind gave a high, shrill cry as Anne hooked her arm into Muriel’s, both of them continuing to ignore the pups nearby. Instead Anne began to regale her mentor with the history of Samhain, speaking in her excitedly passionate, breakneck clip. During one of her brief intakes of breath, Gilbert offered to fetch drinks for everyone, which switched Anne’s train of thought to Marilla’s homemade red currant wine, and all of the ways she had made it “festive” for the holiday. 

Just as Anne began to start her history lesson from the beginning, diving into the origins of the four fire festivals of the ancient Celts, a knock at the door announced the arrival of Jerry and Diana. Gilbert answered the door, abandoning the four punch glasses he was filling at the table, as the final couple of guests entered and discarded their outerwear. 

“Bonsoir, everyone!” Jerry announced as the group came over to greet them. “Can you believe the storm out there? I thought we might be blown away on our way over.” 

“Happy Samhain, everyone!” Diana’s cheery dimples showed as she grinned at the group, sweeping forward to take Anne’s hands in hers and press her cheeks to Anne’s in a French  _ bisous _ . 

“Diana, you look incredible, darling,” Anne said in her best grown up hostess voice, taking in Diana’s long, flowing black dress. Diana laughed, both of them knowing that Anne had come over yesterday to choose her friend’s outfit. 

“Wait, wait, wait,” Bash held up both of his hands as if he could physically halt the flow of conversation in order to keep up. “Is  _ that _ how you say this silly, made-up holiday? ‘ _ Sow-win _ ’? Because my invitation did  _ not _ come with a pronunciation guide and I have been callin’ this thing ‘ _ Sam-hayn’ _ like a moke all week!” 

The group laughed, and Jerry nodded his head emphatically. “Diana told me that I was saying it wrong on the way over, but I thought she was playing a trick on me,” he laughed, his eyes bright. “English is a nightmare,” he added, his Acadian French accent thick. 

“It’s not English, it’s  _ Celtic _ !” Anne defended earnestly as her guest’s laughter redoubled. 

They stood in a loose grouping near the kitchen table, and Gilbert busied himself once more with filling a punch glass for each guest as Anne rattled off a quick phonetic guide to pronouncing long-lost Celtic holidays. 

“Just before you arrived, Anne was telling us all that drinking to excess is a traditional part of the ‘ _ sow-WIN’  _ celebration, so everyone had better take one of these,” he grinned as he passed out the drinks, exaggeratedly emphasizing the proper Celtic pronunciation as he spoke. 

The wind howled against the trees outside as they held their glasses up to one another. Gilbert gave the toast, grinning at Anne from the place where he stood directly across from her in the circle of friends. 

“To the harvest? Or the dead, maybe. Or is it the undead? Or wait, I remember. What is the name of the Pukah ghoul who is supposed to watch over our harvest again?” He was grinning wickedly at Anne, knowing full well that she was bursting to correct him and jump back into the history of the celebration, though Gilbert was fairly certain no one else in the room cared for anything more than the excellent food and company promised. “Oh, anyway. To all of those things, and our gracious hostess, Queen Anne of Faerie, long may she reign.” 

“To Anne!” Everyone raised their glasses, grinning indulgently at their hostess, then downed the contents of their cups. 

Anne gestured toward the laden kitchen table, inviting everyone to supper. The group fell upon the spread, filling their plates as she explained each dish on the table and the origin thereof. Once everyone had a full plate, they entered the sitting room, balancing plates on knees and setting refilled punch glasses on the shrouded coffee table between and beside the ornate candelabras. 

There was quiet for a while, save for the moans of full mouths around the rich food, the creaks and groans of the house as it was buffeted by the storm, and the occasional, distant rumble of thunder. All compliments were duly sent to the chef, who beamed proudly at the group around her. Then Anne took advantage of the hushed moment, speaking at a heightened clip once more. 

“I am so sorry that I promised you all a bonfire that I cannot deliver upon - I hope that building up a roaring fire here in the sitting room hearth won’t disappoint anyone too badly.” She searched her friend’s faces for signs of distress, but found none, though both Bash and Jerry did inexplicably smirk into their punch for a moment. She didn’t pause her speech, however. 

“The ancient Celts would start their bonfires with a great metal wheel, sparking the blaze into life and sacrificing cattle to the gods in thanks for the harvest, as well as an appeasement to Lady Gwyn, the Pukah, and the other monsters of faerie so their children wouldn’t be snatched away in the night.” Anne took a quick, deep breath, having not paused to do so yet. “The turnips helped with that, too -- keeping the home safe from malignant fairies and the like. Did you notice the one hanging by the coat rack? Diana did that one, and it’s my favorite. I think it would scare away any creature with mal intent, don’t you?” 

The question was clearly rhetorical, though Diana smiled and Jerry nodded emphatically. Anne continued more loudly, as the house around them gave a particularly vociferous groan. 

“My favorite myth of Samhain tells the story of a brave man who had to fight a corpse and fight a fire-breathing dragon to save his village from some mystical threat.” Anne’s eyes were bright and shining, and the group’s interest was piqued by the intensity and passion with which she spoke. 

Just then, a blast of icy wind came screaming down the chimney and into the sitting room, scattering a handful of dried leaves and small twigs across the rug at the feet of its occupants with a noise that sounded like a hundred ghouls crying out for revenge. Everyone froze for a brief moment, a chill running around the room, before Bash and Gilbert knelt to gather the kindling and replace it in the hearth. 

“Looks like it’s time to start our indoor bonfire, eh? Will someone please pass me the large metal wheel with which I am to start this inferno?” Bash’s eyes glinted at Anne, and she smiled at him, crinkling her nose at his teasing. 

“I am sorry to confess that this flint and iron striker will have to suffice,” Anne grinned, rising to retrieve the small objects from the mantle. 

Bash bent low to spark at the kindling surrounding the larger pieces of wood, and the group leaned forward, anticipating the coming glow of embers and the warmth that would soon emanate from the stone alcove. Just as Bash struck the flint and iron together, sparks flying from where he had hit the cold iron, a flash of lightning illuminated the candle-lit room, followed immediately by a boom of thunder so loud that each member of the small party felt the quake reverberate in their bones. The group was frozen in fear for a brief moment, the only thing moving were the wide eyes that searched each other’s faces for reassurance. 

“Are you sure we can’t go out and light a proper bonfire tonight, Anne? The Gods seem awfully angry about it.” Gilbert teased from his seat across the room, and a few shaky laughs followed. The sparks Bash had created from his first strike now lay burnt out and cold on the hearth. As he bent over the pile, ready to try again, a new jet of frigid air blew down the chimney, scattering the kindling once more. 

In nearly the same moment, the room was blinded by another violent flash and an accompanying quake of thunder that rattled across the foundations. Then more unsettling and cacophonous noises began: first, the wail of a gale of wind, even louder than the last; then the crack and crash of wood breaking and smashing, followed immediately by the sickening sound of glass shattering, as a branch of Anne’s beloved Snow Queen broke from its trunk and fell through the window near the stairs of Green Gables; this was followed shortly thereafter by a loud  _ thunk _ as the back door gave way under the pressure of the pummelling winds, bursting open to pound angrily against the siding. In the maylay of wind and rain and terrible sounds,the leaves from Anne’s careful decorating were strewn all about the room and the candelabras were blown down, throwing the entire house into an uneasy darkness. 

Everyone lept to their feet as one, then froze, afraid to make the situation worse by barrelling into one another as their eyes adjusted to the darkness. Gilbert was the first to gather his wits, and he issued a rapid succession of orders in his authoritative doctor’s voice. “I think that a tree branch has come through the window. Jerry, go and find the tools to help board up the window. Bash, you and I will go outside and remove the branch.  _ Anne _ ,” here his voice roughened into a bark at the last order. “ _ You don’t have shoes on -- do not move. _ ” 

The men scattered then, two of them for the front door, the third toward the back of the house. Jerry knew there would be loose boards near the pantry cellar because he and Matthew had been replacing the rotting floorboards there for the past few days. Anne could just hear Jerry’s progress over the sound of the wailing wind and continuously slamming back door as he carefully felt his way in the darkness for the tools and boards at the cellar door. 

After a minute of anxious, silent waiting and shallow breathing, the wind carrying away any sounds from the other men as they went about their duties, Anne found her voice. With her hair whipping around her face, it came out reassuring and strong despite the chill that ran all over her. 

“Diana, will you go and fetch the lanterns we stored in the larder? These candles will have all broken, and Jerry will need to be able to see if he is going to board up this window. Muriel, will you get the broom? I laid it against the cellar door.” The two women nodded mutely to Anne, their eyes still wide from fright, and turned to busy themselves, the somewhat calming effect of this new purpose coming over them.

Once she was alone, the sound of the wind whipping straight through the house pressed against Anne’s ears like a vice, and her breathing came in short pants. Her imagination had run away with itself many times - creating phantoms from shadows - but there was something about this moment that seemed to demand that she be made aware of some nearby, sinister force in the world. She shivered against the thought, then tucked her hair firmly behind her ears and drew two deep, calming breaths. Then she forced herself forward. 

She set out for the kitchen, determined to stop the clangorous racket of the back door slamming against its frame over and over again. She tread carefully, knowing from the ruinous sound of the branch shattering the window that shards could be anywhere beneath her vulnerable feet. Beyond the wail of the wind, the house was eerily quiet, and Anne silently told herself over and over again as she took careful steps that this had nothing to do with ancient monsters or fairy tales. 

_ This is just a storm. Weather. Electricity. Nature. Just a storm.  _

She continued to step lightly, moving slowly toward the back of the house, testing each step for a stabbing pain of glass before placing her weight on it. The sliver of moonlight filtering into the house was just enough for her to make out the shapes of the furniture surrounding her, and she focused her gaze on the back door, still open and flapping noisily in the wind. 

As Anne crept forward, she did not yet notice that Matthew’s bedroom door had been thrown wide, though she had made sure it was closed before the guests had arrived. She did not yet see the debris all over the floor, blown about by the wind in small circles as it caught the current. She did not yet look over to see the presence of someone else in the room with her, seated in the dark shadows on the far end of the breakfast nook table, slumped and staring.

Mercifully, Anne reached the door without finding any shrapnel, and she fought hard against the wind to get the back door closed. She locked the bolt, not trusting the weak, faulty latch to hold it closed against the punishing gale outside. She leaned her back against the door once she had finally wrestled it closed, her eyes shut tight and chest heaving. The darkness outside of the door had seemed so sinister to her somehow, the air thick despite the raging wind, like all of the outside world was pressing in, waiting for something to break. 

She heard something moving to her right, then, and her eyes flew open in terror, her heart pounding.  _ Get a hold of yourself, Anne _ the logical part of her mind chastised her as she peered through the darkness, just making out the shape of Muriel holding a broom in one hand, heavy metal dust pan in the other. 

“Muriel,” Anne whispered, her voice croaking as though she hadn’t used it in days instead of minutes. 

Muriel jumped slightly, then her eyes found Anne’s in the darkness and they came together in the darkened kitchen hall, shoulders bumping. A disembodied voice called “ _ Anne! _ ” quietly as a floating light bobbed toward them down the hall, and Anne smiled as she saw Diana’s stern expression behind the lantern she held aloft. 

“Gilbert is going to be so cross with you when he… When… He…” her harsh whisper lost volume as she went, her eyes going wide, pupils dilating to pinpoints as she looked over Anne’s shoulder toward the corner of the kitchen. 

Diana’s shrill scream lasted for an eternity. It rang in Anne’s ears long after it was over, her heart slamming against her ribcage as her gaze moved from Diana’s frozen, horrified expression to the corner where her friend was staring. 

Time stood still as Anne turned and her gaze fell upon the shadowed occupant at the small, round table near the kitchen windows. Her hat sat primly upon her head, the angle severe as always, pinned rigidly in place by two long, sharp hat pins. Her eyes were wide and staring accusingly at the three young women before her, as was her usual custom. 

After a moment, however, the  _ un _ usual aspects of the tableau in front of her struck Anne: the way that the mouth, though open, remained silent and unreproving; the way that her posture, usually so perfectly upright, was off-center, as though she was being held up by the bones of her corset alone, instead of by her usual air of self-righteous pride; the way her hands were still, not pointing or reaching or meddling. 

Anne felt disconnected from her body as she inspected the still being, her own lips opening into an echo of the gruesome  _ o _ frozen on the woman’s lips. They were too far away - the figure too dappled in shadow - to see the dark red stain that ran from the crown of her head and down onto the back of her cream-colored collar. 

But they would see it soon enough - the evidence of her brutal passing. 

Diana’s scream cut off sharply as Anne felt her friend go limp just behind her. She spun in time to catch her as she fell, both of them ungracefully drooping to the ground, Anne beneath - cushioning their fall. The lantern that Diana held fell from her grip as they hit the floor, rolling slowly across the floor and toward the corpse of Mrs. Rachel Lynde, who sat as though she awaited the delivery of a fresh cup of coffee and a second scone. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ****  
> Anne felt her eyebrows draw down and together before conscious thought registered a moment later, louder and clearer than any of her thoughts had been since she had first seen Rachel Lynde’s empty, staring eyes. 
> 
> I know why, her mind answered simply. Everyone will know why. Because it’s Rachel Lynde. Because Rachel Lynde noses in and pokes and prods and peels at every insecurity and fear and sinful thought that you’ve ever had, and because she must have gone too far this time.   
> ****
> 
> [](https://www.flickr.com/photos/187975673@N07/49839655662/in/dateposted-public/)  
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me: no one needs this weird, macabre story right now. it's may. shit is weird enough already. stop trying to make Halloween in Springtime happen. 
> 
> also me: i think in chapter two everyone should have a butcher knife hidden behind their backs and also that you should update on a random Wednesday afternoon lol

Anne found herself in the sitting room without recalling how she had gotten there - a shawl around her shoulders and a cup of wine gripped tightly in her two hands, the angry storm rattling the window behind her. A shudder ripped through her body as she drew the shawl closer and stretched her mind, attempting to retrace her steps; an exercise in sorting through a disorienting blur of ghost-white faces, gentle hands, and voices that arrived muffled and warped, as though she had heard them from deep under water. She took a trembling sip from her cup, willing herself to calm down, to keep a tight hold of her memory -- her sanity. She forced herself to remember. 

She remembered holding Diana, both of them slumped on the floor, Anne’s eyes wide; Diana’s mouth still stretched in a silent scream; laying as though dead. 

_ Dead _ . 

_ No _ , Anne shook herself mentally, gulping down the remaining contents of the glass gripped in her cold hands.  _ Not dead. As though  _ sleeping _ ,  _ she chastised herself. 

Moving briskly past the morbid turn her thoughts had taken - as though she could outrun the memory of Rachel Lynde’s frozen corpse seated at the table in the adjacent room - Anne forced herself to continue through her hazy memories. She recalled the entrance of Jerry from the cellar door, his arms laden with wooden boards and a tool kit, both of which he had dropped when he took in Diana’s crumpled form laying still in Anne’s arms. Then there had been light, bright and harsh, accompanying Gilbert and Bash’s hurried entrance into the kitchen doorway, their footsteps shaking the floor beneath Anne, both men’s clothes soaked through and dripping as they held aloft the lanterns they must have found abandoned by Diana in the sitting room. She remembered the way their faces had twisted and drained when Muriel had lifted a shaking finger toward their uninvited guest. Though she couldn’t bring herself to close her eyes, Anne had not looked again; had no need to look. Every time she blinked the image was there, burned on her retinas like some sort of ghastly photo negative. 

Another violent quake shook Anne’s shoulders, but she forced her mind to continue sorting through the foggy recollections. Gilbert had knelt before Anne at some point after Mrs. Lynde’s corpse was introduced to the men, his cold, white hands brushing hair out of her face, his voice low and searching, though she couldn’t remember the form his words had taken. He must have helped her into the sitting room - possibly even carried her, if the fuzzy image of the hallway swaying around her was real - before heading back outside to deal with boarding up the front window. A small voice in the back of her mind wondered whether there was anyone left alive in the house, and Anne squeezed her eyes shut so tightly that her vision went from black to white and her head began to pound. 

_ What if the killer came back for more, and you are the only one left? What if he is standing right in front of you right now, cudgel raised, waiting until he can see the fear in your eyes before he strikes!  _

Anne’s eyes flew wildly open, her heart banging against her chest as though it would run and leave her to her doom, and she began to search out clues as to the fate of her companions. The thought of being left alone in the flickering lantern light of this haunted house had gripped the back of her neck with strong, ice-cold fingers that pricked her skin and chilled her blood. She found that her only other companion was Diana, who still lay as though dead-  _ sleeping _ \- on the couch next to her. Anne heard the pounding of a hammer along the front of the house --  _ Gilbert _ , her mind supplied helpfully -- and low voices toward the back of the house. Had she heard Bash and Jerry talking quietly about moving Mrs. Lynde to rest atop Matthew’s vacant bed earlier? Had Muriel gone out alone into the cold, dark night to fetch the constable? No, Bash would not have allowed that. Muriel was surely here somewhere, tidying or helping or perhaps hiding in some corner from an  _ advancing masked murderer, slowly stalking forward as Muriel gasped and pleaded for her life... _

Anne shook once more, this time on purpose as she tried rattling her brain from its current gruesome bent, forcing her thoughts down a less disturbing pathway. She considered the idea of Avonlea’s “constable” - a rather stringent term for the volunteer position currently held by Mr. Irving, a local banker. Their town had no jailhouse, nor courthouse, nor any other official buildings of that nature. When people felt the need to involve the “police” in their affairs, Mr. Irving was called out to talk sensibly with folks until an agreement could be reached - usually over a handshake, often with the promise of a shared meal, or at least a warm slice of pie. Avonlea did not have any crime statistics - just a preacher for aiding lost souls and a constable for reporting at the annual P.E.I. Policeman’s Ball hosted each spring in Summerside, where one may eat their weight in steamed clams and blueberry buckle, according to Mrs. Paul Irving, a rather staunch woman who enjoyed the menu more than the company at social events, according to Rachel Lynde. 

_ Rachel Lynde. _ Anne pressed her eyes closed once more, a loud, heavy breath pushing from her chest in an audible  _ huff _ .  _ Perhaps _ , Anne thought to herself,  _ I should be grateful that the town busybody will not be able to spread lurid tidings of this ‘godless tribute to savagery’  _ \-- as the recently deceased herself had called Anne’s fête only yesterday as she had wagged a fat finger in Anne’s scowling face. Anne laughed to herself, her lips unsmiling while her tongue tasted the bitterness of the memory.  _ This night will be the talk of the island for years to come _ .  _ And here I thought I had finally grown used to being the talk of the town - soon the entire island will know about Avonlea’s ‘red-headed witch orphan’ and her devilry.  _

Muriel came back into the room then, having left to return the broom to the pantry after sweeping up the shards of glass and wood strewn across the floor. Anne noted that Muriel’s face was drained of all color, hands clasped tightly together in front of her, and she sat up straighter, leaning forward to place her empty glass on the coffee table. Their eyes met as Muriel came to sit in the armchair next to Anne, and their hands grasped each other’s when the walls rattled with another loud crack of thunder. 

“Anne, how are you?” Muriel’s voice came out as a whisper. 

“I’m…” Anne shook her head softly, unable to finish that sentence, not sure she ever would be able to put into words the way her chest felt crushed by an immovable weight; the way her stomach turned over every few moments; the way her eyes felt desiccated, like a desert aching for rain; nor the way she suddenly felt like throwing her head back and laughing until she was gasping for breath. 

“Is she--” Anne tried again, but she didn’t seem able to finish a question, either. She gulped around the bubble of maniacal mirth lodged in her throat, and shook her head once more. 

Muriel nodded, seeming to understand. She answered quietly, “Bash and Jerry laid her down in Matthew’s room. She… it would seem that she was… the back of her head had…” Muriel’s lips continued moving, but the volume went out each time, as though she had been jinxed by a benevolent fairy, forbidding her to voice the unspeakable. 

The women’s eyes met once more, Anne’s wide and unblinking, Muriel’s hooded, too dark to read. Another howl of wind ripped through the air outside. 

Anne heard low voices down the hall, but she couldn’t focus her mind on them. After a long moment of silence, she opened her mouth to speak, the desire to laugh suddenly gone, her voice coming out as a croak. 

“ _ Who _ ?” The thought had been trying to break through her consciousness all this time, gnawing at the edges of every thought, worrying at her mind like a dog at a bone. 

“ _ Why _ ?” Muriel’s hollow voice seemed to echo back Anne’s question, changing it subtly as it bounced back to the younger girl. 

Anne felt her eyebrows draw down and together before conscious thought registered a moment later, louder and clearer than any of her thoughts had been since she had first seen Rachel Lynde’s empty, staring eyes. 

_ I know why _ , her mind answered simply. Everyone  _ will know  _ why _. Because it’s  _ Rachel Lynde.  _ Because Rachel Lynde noses in and pokes and prods and peels at every insecurity and fear and sinful thought that you’ve ever had, and because  _ she must have gone too far this time. 

The callousness and confidence of Anne’s thoughts that did not, in fact, answer either woman’s question caused another convulsion to shake Anne’s thin frame. Muriel squeezed her fingers around Anne’s, holding her tighter, offering what warmth she could spare. 

Anne’s extremities felt ice cold, frozen, when another sharp blast of wind rattled across the roof, some of it escaping down the chimney, stirring dried leaves and bark to scatter across the stone hearth once more. Anne felt a sharp stab of something that felt awfully close to anger as she recalled the reason for the kindling - the way that this night was supposed to be dedicated to the appeasing of ancient spirits and traditions. By now they were meant to have told stories around a blazing hearth, to have eaten and drunk and laughed the night away while the malevolent storm outside blew harmlessly across the empty fields. 

Heat rushed into Anne’s cheeks, then her limbs were flushed as her heart picked up an aggrieved rhythm. She had already had to make concessions for the evening -- giving up her dreams of roasting tree nuts at a blazing bonfire outside -- as well as fought tooth and nail for its existence in the first place -- against Marilla first, then Rachel Lynde and the other whispering, staring, pointing small minds that made up the bulk of this tiny, inconsequential town that she loved in spite of its many shortcomings.

And now this -  _ Rachel Lynde has found a way to spoil my evening after all!  _ As soon as the uncharitable, irrational thought had entered Anne’s mind, her temper cooled itself, and she bit her lip guiltily. 

_ No, not Rachel Lynde, _ Anne chided herself.  _ Someone else…  _

And then her mind followed the next logical step in its path:  _ Someone Rachel Lynde had made terribly angry… so perhaps it  _ is  _ her doing after all…  _

Anne shook her head more roughly this time, willing her mind to work properly; to stop the illogical anger that she felt building inside of her. She needed to get going again - to find out who had done this, and how, and  _ why _ ? At least,  _ why tonight _ ?! 

Both women jumped as the front door banged open, the wind ripping it from Gilbert’s hand to crash noisily against the wall as he came back inside, Matthew’s leather tool bag gripped in one hand. Gilbert was thoroughly soaked now, his hair wind-raked and dripping onto his shoulders, his sweater plastered to his chest, pant legs stuck to his legs as he grabbed the handle and wrestled the door shut once more. 

His eyes immediately searched out Anne’s, and he drew a deep, steadying breath into his chest, dropping the tools and striding toward her. He stopped himself just outside of the sitting room rug, remembering himself (and the wrath of Marilla) just in time. 

“Anne,” he spoke quietly, still staring into her eyes. “Are you alright?” 

Anne had stood to move toward him as he approached, and she met him at the rug’s edge, gripping the hands he stretched out toward her. She pressed her lips together, willing her mind to come up with an answer to his question, but nothing was forthcoming. 

A bobbing light approached from the hallway, signaling the return of Jerry and Bash from their work in the back of the house. 

“We laid her in Matthew’s room,” Bash announced quietly from the doorway, face somber as his eyes found Muriel where she sat on the arm chair, still as a statue. Jerry didn’t stop until he was kneeling at the couch next to Diana’s prone form, his eyebrows drawn downward and his teeth grit together. 

Bash looked toward Gilbert then, his grim expression unchanging. 

“You alright there, Blythe?” 

“I’m fine. Got the window boarded up. I think we should all plan on staying here tonight - that storm out there is awful fierce, and the rain doesn’t look like it will let up anytime soon.” Gilbert shrugged a single shoulder as he answered, a sonorous roll of thunder accompanying his quiet declaration, eyes still glued to Anne’s. 

“I should fetch you some dry clothes,” Anne’s voice came out raw and rough, her whisper barely audible above the baleful wind. She turned purposefully toward the back of the house, where Matthew’s room adjoined the kitchen space, when she remembered what Bash had just said. About where the body currently lay. The dead body of Rachel Lynde. A violent tremor rocked her frame, and her knees gave out for a moment, her body slumping downward before a pair of strong hands wrapped around her waist and pulled her backward, resting her weight against a firm, broad expanse. 

“Easy, Darling,” Gilbert murmured in her ear, pulling her backward until she was held up against his chest, his strong arm wrapped around her middle, fingers squeezing her reassuringly. Though Anne felt the water from his sopping wet clothes begin to seep through her dress, he still transferred only warmth and comfort to her shivering frame. 

Gilbert had looked up at the rest of the group as he deftly supported Anne’s weight. “I’ll go with Anne. Bash? You alright to...” Gilbert trails off, his eyes locked on his brother’s. A wordless communication seemed to pass between them, and Bash nodded once, sharply, before striding toward Muriel’s armchair. 

Anne shook her head slightly, trying to dispel the dizziness, when she felt Gilbert maneuver her slightly so that he stood by her side, his arm wound tightly around her waist and their hips pressed together, and then begin to move them both down the hall toward the only dry men’s clothes in the vicinity.  _ Which also happens to be a crypt at the moment _ , Anne thought sardonically. Some other part of her brain wondered at her ability to be sharp-tongued when she could barely control her limbs.  _ Perhaps that is something you should ponder at a later date _ , she quipped to herself. Another thought came directly on the heels of the last:  _ Oh, wonderful. Sarcasm has arrived _ . 

Anne shook her head, dislodging the foothold of her chaotic thoughts as Gilbert slowed their approach. They had entered the kitchen, and Anne found that she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the breakfast table in the corner. She found herself wondering which dark spots on the floor in the corner were shadows thrown from the lantern light flickering from the tabletop, and which something more sinister. 

_ Poor Marilla, _ Anne thought suddenly.  _ Her kitchen floors are the pride of all Avonlea -- what will she do when she finds them bloodstained?  _

Another, more rational voice in Anne’s mind whispered that surely Marilla will be more distraught at the death of her best friend, and relatively unconcerned with the state of her floors, but Anne wasn’t left time to dwell on the coming grief for her mother-figure. 

Gilbert squeezed Anne to him gently, and she looked up to find him gazing intently into her face.  _ He is assessing me for signs of shock _ . The dull, clinical thought made her want to laugh out loud for some reason.

His eyebrows drew together, and he reached his free hand up to grip her shoulder. “I can go in alone if you’d like to wait here?” His voice pitched higher at the end, eyes still searching hers. 

Anne glanced back at the breakfast nook, the either shadow-or-blood-stained floors, and imagined standing alone in the silent, wavering darkness while Gilbert searched Matthew’s dresser for accoutrements. What little color there was in her face drained away as Gilbert watched, and she bit her bottom lip, shaking her head and reaching up to grip his arm tightly. 

“Don’t leave me,” she croaked, eyes swimming. 

Gilbert squeezed her close to him once more, then reached behind her to grab the lantern resting on the table before turning to open Matthew’s door. 

The door to Matthew’s room creaked, and a distant part of Anne thought that Green Gables was truly playing the role of  _ Background to a Gruesome Murder _ a little too well this evening, between the creaking and broken tree limbs and the incessant howling of the wind down the chimney, the pounding of rain against walls and roof. 

The way her thoughts continued to bounce from macabre to the jeering to the cold, out-of-body observations was exhausting, and Anne wished distantly that just one of the voices would take control so she could figure out what to do or how to feel. Instead she mutely followed Gilbert into Matthew’s bedroom, carefully keeping her eyes glued to the floor as they entered. 

***

Jerry lifted Diana’s shoulders, cradling her head as he slid onto the couch beneath her, laying her head gently back down in his lap. He stroked her hair softly, trusting Gilbert’s assessment that her mind had received a shock, but that she was otherwise healthy and well; that she would wake up when she was ready. 

Jerry couldn’t say that he had known Mrs. Lynde very well, nor did he like what little he knew of her. She had never been particularly kind to him, having treated his presence at Green Gables as that of invisible servant rather than beloved friend and farmhand, but he didn’t let it bother him, scarce as their interactions were. In fact, he could have counted his interactions with her on one hand. 

At least, he could have before she caught him hiding a golden pocket watch in a knothole behind the Cuthbert’s barn last week. 

“ _ It was my uncle’s - he gave it to me as a birthday gift, but I didn’t mean to bring it to work. I was afraid of losing it -- I thought it would be safe here. _ ” 

Jerry’s frown deepened as he carded his fingers slowly through Diana’s hair, another long roll of thunder sounding as the rain beat a rhythm against Green Gables. He had thought that his hurried explanation to Mrs. Lynde had saved him from further scrutiny, as she had simply narrowed her eyes at him, then turned her back and made her way up to the main house. Jerry had heaved a sigh of relief, thanking his lucky stars that he was able to buy himself just a few more days… that is, until he had found the letter she had stashed in the barn for him only this morning. 

_ Meet me behind the post office at midnight tonight. Come alone, or I will tell the Cuthberts exactly what you and your sticky fingers have been up to. _

The letter had been left unsigned, but Jerry had no question as to who had written it. The hand resting in Diana’s dark curls balled into a fist as red-hot anger pulsed through Jerry’s veins. 

No, he didn’t know Rachel Lynde well, but he couldn’t say that he was sorry he would never get the chance to.

***

Gilbert held the lantern aloft in front of them, his fully-extended arm the only indication that he might feel trepidation in entering this room, too. It wasn’t that he was afraid of the dead - he had dealt with enough illness and death already in his twenty-five years to make him all-but-immune to the sight of a body laying still and cold atop a worn, tobacco-stripe quilt. 

The bloodied corpse of a murder victim, however, was something new to him entirely. 

He held one of Anne’s hands firmly in his, so he felt it as she turned left toward Matthew’s dresser, prying her hand from his as she began opening drawers. He was slow to rotate toward her, leaving her groping in the shadows as his eyes stuck fast to the wide-open eyes of Rachel Lynde. He could imagine her unseeing stare as harsh and critical; could imagine her picking apart the Cuthbert’s ceiling for being too long without white-washing, too low, too… anything, really. Rachel Lynde could find fault with a cowbell. 

_ Could have, _ Gilbert corrected himself. It was hard to admit that she really was dead, when he could so easily picture her sitting up to lecture him for dripping on Marilla’s floors. 

Gilbert was suddenly back in the upstairs linen closet at the Gillis house, the sounds of the raucous dance a floor beneath them all but drowning out the soft sighs in his ear, his breath coming hot and fast against Anne’s exposed neck, where he had buried his face as he moved roughly against her. The sudden awareness that the door behind him was opening. The way he had tried to shield Anne from the intruder while pulling his trousers back up around his waist. The scheming, malevolent eyes staring back at his wide, startled ones. The way her voice hadn’t risen, had not even quavered, as she had sneered. 

_ “My, my… what do we have here?” _   
  
Gilbert’s blood boiled as the memory crashed over him, and he found that his face had twisted into a sneer as he gazed down at the carcass before him. 

“Gil?” Anne’s voice was little more than a whisper, and he spun quickly, rearranging his features as he turned his back on the woman who had threatened his happiness not long ago. 

“Here you are,” Anne’s eyes were trained on his shoes as she held out a small pile of Matthew’s clothes, her voice still strangled. 

Gilbert reached out, but instead of taking the clothes from Anne he gripped her by one wrist, pulling her to him roughly and crushing her body to his, the clothes caught between them in her hands. He felt her shoulders begin to shake as a sob erupted from her throat, the sound muffled as she buried her face in his shoulder. 

“Shhh… it’s alright, Anne… you’re safe… I’ll keep you safe…” Gilbert rubbed circles into Anne’s back, trying to soothe away the soft cries of pain that continued to shake her frame. 

“She can’t threaten us… can’t hurt us anymore…” his voice was quiet, a dark menace creeping into the words meant as much for Anne as they were for the lingering, ever-watchful presence of Rachel Lynde over his shoulder. 

***

Bash perched lightly on the arm of the chair Muriel occupied, his eyes roving the room every few seconds, mind working tirelessly. His hand had come to rest on Muriel’s shoulder, and he gave her soft, reassuring squeezes every time his thoughts rolled over, recycling the same answerless questions. 

_ Had anyone overheard...? Had Muriel confided...? Had anyone seen...? Had Gilbert let slip…? Who and how and why?  _

_ Were they safe? Had he put them all in jeopardy - his daughter, his brothers, mother…  _ her _? Had anyone overheard…? _

Bash swallowed painfully around the lump lodged in his throat as he tried to break the endless cyclone of thoughts tearing through his mind, throwing his emotions every which way. He wanted to grab Muriel and run - take his family and hide from those who would use them as easy scapegoats. 

_ “If you’re capable of thinking that you have the right to this woman, there is no end to the heinous crimes you could commit.” _

The words  _ she  _ had spat at him came back to him now, Rachel Lynde’s red, angry face filling his mind as he felt his blood boil in his veins; felt every time someone had called him  _ uppity  _ or  _ animal  _ as he had strolled past them, pretending he hadn’t heard; felt every time someone nodded politely at him, then turned wide eyes at their neighbor, gawking at his presumption, the gaul of him to exist, to take up space in their safe haven of Avonlea. The maelstrom of memories and emotions engulfed him for a brief moment, drowning him in a hatred so galling and bitter that he very nearly spit on the ground in front of him. 

He grit his teeth together, eyes roving the dark corners of the sitting room, as he recalled that his most vocal opponent was now a relic laying still and cold just down the hall. A grim satisfaction stole over him, his lips turning up at the corners as he gave Muriel’s shoulder another tight squeeze. 

_ Soon no one will be able to deny us, _ Bash thought, a flinty determination in his eyes, his chin notching up stubbornly. 

And then the front door burst open with bang like a gunshot, another long rumble of thunder accompanying the entrance of the veiled figure in the doorway. 

She stood erect, shoulders thrown back rigidly despite the fierce storm she had battled to get there. A large, dark oil-skin draped from the crown of her head down toward the floor, falling just above the bottom of her skirts, which were dark with mud and dripping sludge onto the entryway floor, throwing her face into shadow. 

The loud noise, as well as the gust of wind that tore through the room, seemed to rouse both Muriel and Diana, the two women sitting bolt-upright in their seats. Bash and Jerry had leapt to their feet at the cacophony, and a slamming door and racing footsteps told Bash that Gilbert and Anne were on their way to inspect the newcomer, as well. 

Her shoulders heaved from the effort it had cost her to make it through the melee outside, but after she cleared her throat once, sharply - as she did most things - she spoke, her voice as crisp and as ever as she removed the oilskin and shook it out before turning to hang it to dry behind her. 

“What’s happened?” she called over her shoulder, turning back to the group as her lips formed a slight smile, warming her otherwise stern expression. 

“You all look as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs!” Her smile grew as she scrutinized the nervous crowd before her, watching as they glanced at one another, then quickly away, most gazes landing on the sitting room rug. 

Marilla’s hands found her hips, a smile breaking across her mouth in full.

“Really, you all look as though you’ve seen a whole barrel of ghosts. Is there a killer on the loose that I should know about?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tysm for reading, for the kind comments on chapter one, and for overall just being the best fandom ever. i love y'all, and am so grateful that you will still read my nonsense, seriously-not-the-time-or-place fic. thank you and bless you and please please please tell me what you think! xoxoxo


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Murdered,” Marilla whispered to herself, the word and all of its implications foreign upon her tremulous lips. She forced herself to draw in another slow, deep breath. 
> 
> “None of you saw Mrs. Lynde before Diana spotted her in the kitchen, then? Anne, she didn’t drop by while you were setting up for the party? Not one of you passed her on the road to Green Gables this evening?” Marilla’s back was to the room, her voice cold and brittle, ready to crack at the slightest pressure.   
> *****  
> [](https://www.flickr.com/photos/187975673@N07/49839655662/in/dateposted-public/)  
> 

A trembling mass of bone-white limbs and once-white dress lay in a shuddering heap at Marilla’s feet, the once-ethereal garment surrounding her daughter now darkened and dingy from the number of times the girl had found herself on the unforgiving wooden surface. Anne lay with her head cradled in the matriarch’s worn lap, wrapping her ghost-pale arms around Marilla’s thin waist and inhaling her rain-dampened scent, then exhaling in a single burst as a full body shudder shook her frame. Each time the wind wailed against the outside of Green Gables Anne pictured a giant, ghastly woman with long, slender arms and fire in her eyes drawing nearer, coming to pluck Anne and her friends from their shelter, determined to carry them away with her into the heart of the lightning bolt she called home. As though it could help to hide her quaking, Anne pressed her face deeper into Marilla’s skirts, willing her embrace to imbue comfort and strength to her stunned and heartsick mother, though Anne had precious little of either to offer at the moment. 

Marilla sat ramrod straight in her chair, one hand gripping the armrest with silent ferocity and the other resting lightly upon the haphazard tangle of titian hair spilling across her lap. Anne blinked away the vision of the vengeful harpie’s approach, shaking her head to pull herself back into the present moment. Her heart gave a painful squeeze as she tried to think of something to say, remembering the way that Marilla’s face had drained of color not long after she had returned home, at how she had stumbled into the armchair as though she was suddenly burdened by a physical weight on her shoulders. 

Marilla had known Rachel Lynde when they were both girls, so Rachel had been afforded the kind of lifelong loyalty that only those tender experiences of burgeoning womanhood could give: with each secret of Marilla’s that Rachel had coaxed forward and kept private, Rachel had purchased for herself a decade of excuses and exceptions from the customarily unforgiving Marilla. Rachel had loved Marilla despite her flaws and follies, so it had only seemed fair that she do the same, afterall. The intimacy that the friends shared over the years fossilized their devotion to one another, come what may, allowing Marilla to turn a blind eye to the ways that her friend had changed - the way she gradually turned from idle town gossip to malicious puppeteer as she aged. 

Now Marilla was faced with a loss so vast that she could scarcely draw a full breath, her mind reeling with the knowledge that her oldest friend would never darken her doorway again, bringing with her a whirlwind of tales from town, unasked-for advice, and a voracious appetite for both the trivialities of Marilla’s life as well as her baked goods. Muted voices sounded in the background of these thoughts, murmured conversations slowly erupting from around the crowded sitting room, but Marilla paid them no mind until a cool hand brushed her cheek.

“Oh, Marilla.” Anne’s quiet voice was heavy with borrowed grief as she touched her mother’s face, wiping ineffectually at the tears silently running in rivulets down the aged woman’s face. 

Marilla’s head snapped downward, her eyes finding the girl’s in time to see aching sorrow which bordered on pity in Anne’s eyes. She knew that look well: knew it from her youth, as word of first her brother’s death and then her mother’s peculiarities spread across Avonlea; knew it from when she had refused John’s offer to take her far away from home, and, instead of waiting, of staying, he had boarded a train with a one-way ticket and never looked back. Suddenly Marilla’s mind cleared like a flame catching tinder. Rigid training, crafted from a lifetime of bitter disillusionment, kicked in as Marilla dragged the backs of her hands under her eyes, clearing the cooling tracks of tears from her visage and sniffing purposefully. 

She moved to standing in the next moment, nearly knocking Anne onto her back with the abruptness of her action. Marilla reached out with a quick hand to grab at Anne’s flailing arm, righting her balance in the same movement as her other hand swept swiftly down her dress, brushing the invisible dust of grief and memories away for the time being, knowing they would linger in the air until the time to return to motionless reflection came, when her waiting, frightened audience had thinned enough that her sorrow could settle heavily upon her shoulders without the added burden of pity to bear. 

Now was not the time for grief. Now was the time for grit. And if anyone was made and meant to get to the bottom of this night of depthless horrors, it was Marilla Cuthbert. 

“Thank you all,” Marilla croaked out before she paused to clear her throat. She pulled her shoulders back, finally reaching her full height complete with military posture and began again. 

“Thank you all for taking care of Ra-- of Mrs. Lynde’s body. You have all acquitted yourselves most admirably in the last hour. Now,” here she paused to make brief but steely eye contact with each young adult in the room, “tell me what happened.  _ Everything _ that happened. Start from the beginning.” 

The room was completely still for a heartbeat, the wailing wind drowning out the shuddered intake of breath from around the room. After a moment, Marilla’s lips had disappeared from her face as she bit down on them to keep from making a noise of pain or impatience, waiting for the silent sitting room before her to bring forth the details that would make sense of the death of her friend. The wailing wind rattled the windows in their panes as the occupants of the room eyed each other silently for a moment. In the stillness Marilla realized that her hands were trembling, so she grasped them tighter together, standing even taller if it were possible, and nodding her head once as if to give permission for the painful recollections to commence. 

Anne opened her mouth to obey, pouring forth every detail of her preparations for the coming party and the unwelcome storm that came with it. She spoke of the arrival of her guests, of food and chatter, then she told of the awful crash and terrible darkness, the directions the party had all gone to help with the catastrophe, not knowing that a larger and permanent calamity was lying in wait. 

“When the men had all gone, I… we…”

As Anne waivered, Diana opened her lips, which were still white around the edges. Her quavering voice echoed around the sitting room as she leaned more heavily into the arms of Jerry, who was still embracing her in a way that Marilla’s presence would normally have broken up long before. Diana seemed to use all of her remaining strength to help Anne continue. 

“We found Mrs. Lynde at the breakfast table. Her back was against the wall and her eyes were open wide and there was…” here she swallowed with some difficulty “there was a dark stain at the collar of her dress. That lovely lace collar has been irreparably soiled...” Diana’s voice had started out steadily, but wavered more with every word, losing volume until she finished with a whisper, her hands kneading one another as she spoke until there seemed to be nothing left in her. 

“I found a wound at the back of her skull,” Gilbert joined in, his voice loud in the stillness that followed Diana’s final whimper. “It was fairly fresh, and looked to have been caused by a great deal of force trauma, likely from a heavy object or terrible fall. I checked for a pulse as I arrived on the scene, but found none. Her body is not yet cold or experiencing signs of  _ rigor mortis _ , which generally takes around twelve hours to set in. All of which lead to the conclusion that Mrs. Lynde came to harm at some point this evening, likely during our...celebrations.” His clinical tone was callous and clear until he met eyes with Anne at the last word. Before his obvious hesitation to sully Anne’s poor party further, only those who knew him best would have been able to detect the faint tremor in his voice at the words  _ wound  _ and  _ trauma  _ and  _ pulse _ . 

“We had scattered all over the house a few minutes before we found the body,” Jerry affirmed, his voice pitched high and his gaze bouncing from one object to the next in the crowded room. “I was sent downstairs for supplies when I heard footsteps above me. Then someone closed the door, then the window, and a moment later the... the screaming began.” Jerry glanced at Diana from the corner of his eye, his arms tightening, hands trembling slightly. Behind Marilla, no one noticed Anne cock her head to the side, her brow furrowing. 

“Somehow me and Gilbert heard the screamin’ over the gale outside and came runnin’.” Bash leaned forward, elbows on knees, his hands fastened together in front of him, his stare fixed on the pale floorboards as he spoke. Marilla noticed Gilbert twitch in his seat from the corner of her eye, but before she could ask or Gilbert could chime in, Muriel began to speak. 

“After the men had left the party, Anne asked Diana to fetch a light and sent me for the broom next to the garden tools behind the cellar door. She -  _ Anne  _ \- didn’t have any shoes on, so we thought she would sit tight while we went to help, but when I returned with the broom I found her in the kitchen by the back door. Diana came down the hall with a lantern then, and that’s when she… when we saw…” Muriel’s usually precise voice wavered in uncertainty as she spoke, her eyes empty and staring at Bash’s clasped hands. “Anne was holding Diana on the floor when Jerry rushed in, then Gilbert ran in through the front door with Bash soon following. We all stood huddled together for a few moments, then the men deputized one another to take care of the… situation…”

“No one thought to send for the constable in this awful squall,” Anne shuddered delicately. “Do you suppose we ought to have?” 

Marilla’s forehead creased with terror at the thought of any of these children - for she couldn’t help thinking of them as such - going out into the storm she had traversed, and Gilbert nodded his assent. 

“By the time everyone had done their tasks - Jerry and Sebastian moved Mrs. Lynde to Matthew’s bed, and I went out front to finish boarding up the window while Muriel swept up the broken glass - we had just settled into this room to attempt a hearthfire when you arrived, Ms. Cuthbert.” Gilbert made eye contact with Marilla, and found her gaze as piercing as ever, her mind at work behind her shrewd grey eyes and pinched mouth. 

No one spoke for a long moment, the occupants of the small sitting room still and white as the wind wailed and the house groaned around them. Marilla paced in three large steps to stand before the fireplace, resting her hands on the mantle and allowing herself a single steadying breath. She would not imagine the sentient corpse of Rachel Lynde, which she had refused to lay eyes upon, cold and frozen and gruesome in the shadows of her kitchen, or laying still and cold on her brother’s bed. She would focus on the events of the evening, the hows and whys, and try to piece together what possibly could have happened. 

“ _ Murdered _ ,” Marilla whispered to herself, the word and all of its implications foreign upon her tremulous lips. She forced herself to draw in another slow, deep breath. 

“None of you saw Mrs. Lynde before Diana spotted her in the kitchen, then? Anne, she didn’t drop by while you were setting up for the party? Not one of you passed her on the road to Green Gables this evening?” Marilla’s back was to the room, her voice cold and brittle, ready to crack at the slightest pressure. 

The group of young people began to slowly shake their heads, eyeing one another as they did so. None of them noticed that Jerry couldn’t quite meet their eyes, didn’t quite signal his answer, before Muriel cleared her throat and voiced their consensus aloud for Marilla’s benefit. “No, it would seem that none of us saw her… before…” 

“The last time I saw Mrs. Lynde was when she was here yesterday for tea, Marilla, and you remember the awful state she was in then. She was so  _ angry  _ with me for going ahead with  _ ‘this immoral, irreligious, devilish foolery’ _ , as I believe she put it.” Anne’s eyebrow quirked and her quiet voice turned icy as she quoted the words that Rachel had shouted at her the day before, both women’s faces red and chests heaving by the time Rachel had given up and stormed away. 

“I half expected her to show up here in high dudgeon after you left to visit your cousin this afternoon,” Anne added, her face lighting up in belated surprise as she remembered that Marilla wasn’t supposed to be standing here at all this evening. “Oh Marilla, how ever did you make it back from Carmody in that storm? Did something happen on the train? Are the Keiths all well?” 

Marilla’s shoulders stiffened, and she answered Anne while still facing the cold hearth. “I haven’t any idea how the Keiths are doing - I only made it to Spencervale before the trains stopped running and I had to hitch a ride back with Mr. Harrison, who was on his way home from Bright River. I’m only grateful that Matthew arrived there yesterday - hopefully he has been of some use to poor Cousin Mary and her young ones in all of this awful weather.”

“Oh, I hope he wasn’t worried when you didn’t arrive this evening. You don’t think he would head out to look for you, would he? Not in the middle of an actual  _ tempest _ ?” Anne’s face paled as she imagined Matthew wending his way through the fracas that battered itself against Green Gables; imagined the long, bleached fingers of the woman in white wrapping around him and throwing him to the winds. 

“Hush, Anne. Matthew would never be so foolish.” Marilla turned to sharply chide the girl even as her own face drained of color. The matriarch’s knees wobbled and Gilbert jolted forward with arms outstretched, ready to catch her if she fell. He placed an arm around her shoulders and guided her toward his seat on the chaise next to Anne with a determined insistence. 

Anne jumped up in the same moment Marilla was made to sit, alarm evident on her freckled face. “You must be famished, Marilla! It’s been a night of nasty shocks of the most gruesome sort. Don’t move. Let me make you a plate.” She bustled toward the dining table as she spoke, keeping her chin held high and firmly avoiding looking at the darkened breakfast corner where Rachel Lynde had sat silently regarding the party whose very existence she had so loathed. 

Diana and Muriel moved to the chaise next to Marilla, Diana reaching to grip the older woman’s hand as Muriel quietly offered to fetch a glass of wine. Marilla nodded curtly at her question, but her eyes were shining and softened with tired gratitude for the kindness of these beloved young women. 

Jerry followed Muriel and Anne to the dining table, collecting empty glasses from around the room as he went to fill with the rich mulled wine in the bowl at the center of the long-forgotten Samhain spread. The three at the table murmured quietly as Diana lay a head on Marilla’s shoulder, a gesture of affection that soothed the raw edges of Marilla’s nerves and comforted the young woman at the same time. 

Gilbert moved to sit by Bash, who had hardly moved since Marilla’s arrival. As the rest of the party broke into whispered conversations, Gilbert leaned toward his brother and spoke in an undertone. 

“You weren’t with me.” 

Sebastian’s head snapped toward Gilbert at this quiet accusation. Brown eyes bore into brown eyes, the only common feature on the brothers’ faces silently sizing each other up, trying to divine what the other wasn’t saying. Sebastian swallowed silently, his throat convulsing noticeably as the rest of his form was locked in frozen tension, defensiveness clear in every taught line of his body. 

“When we went to remove the tree branch from the window, you shouted something. The wind carried it away -- I didn’t hear. And when I looked up you were running, disappearing around the corner of the house.” Gilbert gazed steadily into Bash’s eyes as he spoke slowly, clearly, neither man so much as blinking. 

Sebastian moved suddenly as he leaned, almost lunged, toward Gilbert, their faces now centimeters apart. His eyes didn’t look angry, though, only frightened. Desperate. As though he was seeing Gilbert through the bars of a cage. 

“I saw somethin’,” Bash’s voice was barely audible, even though Gilbert could feel the warmth of his breath brush his face as he spoke. “A shadow, runnin’. Fast. Somethin’… I thought I saw... Someone. Movin’ fast. I ran to see, to look and make sure… But nothin’ was there. There was no one. It was the wind or the trees, somethin’ playing tricks. I only wanted to make sure. And then Diana hollered and I turned and ran back. That was it.” 

Gilbert’s gaze was still locked on Sebastian’s, and he nodded in a gesture of comfort rather than understanding. Gilbert’s mind sorted through Bash’s description and the possibilities surrounding his brother’s tale quickly as he weighed his brother’s words against his own options. 

His shrewd calculations took only a moment, leaving Gilbert markedly drained once he had made his decision. He gave in to the sudden ache behind his eyes, and he closed them, cutting himself off from the intense gaze of his brother and bringing to his attention the searing headache he had developed at some point in the last ninety seconds. 

When he opened his eyes again, he saw that Bash was still locked away, caged in the fear of what this admission could cost him; of what he could be accused of if the wrong person with the wrong view of things got hold of this information. 

And suddenly Gilbert found the decision before him easy, effortless. Uncovering the truth of Mrs. Lynde’s murderer was nothing to Gilbert when compared to the look in his brother’s eyes at that moment. So long as Sebastian’s safety and credibility were in Gilbert’s hands, his brother need never fear. 

Gilbert reached out to clap a hand on his brother’s arm, squeezing tightly and furrowing his brow in a determined line. He nodded, wordlessly communicating his confidence to Sebastian, whose body visibly relaxed beneath Gilbert’s warm hand. 

“I think someone was runnin’, Blythe. But if any Avonlea folks knew that you had lost sight of me, even if just for a second…” Bash’s voice wobbled violently, and Gilbert couldn’t tell if it was from fear or rage or a potent cocktail of the two that he, in his comfortable position of privilege, could never begin to understand. 

“Shhh I know. I know.” Gilbert soothed quietly, squeezing Bash’s arm again suffusing every bit of trust he felt into his voice. His stomach roiled at the audacious unfairness of it all, but he emitted only an aura of confidence to his brother. 

Bash’s eyes closed, and his posture slumped further, as though the trust he found in Gilbert had given him permission to relax. As if he was able to share the heavy burden he carried everywhere he went, if only for the briefest moment. 

In the dining room, Jerry handed Muriel the first handful of glasses of wine, and she turned to distribute them to the shaken group as Anne approached, a plate filled with various hors d'oeuvres piled onto it haphazardly. 

“Did you say… Jerry, did you mention something about a window closing? You told Marilla that I closed the back door, and then the window before the… before we…  _ before.  _ But I didn’t.”

Anne’s eyes shone in the flickering candlelight, too large in her pale face, as the wind buffeted the trees outside, and a sudden chill crept down the back of Jerry’s neck. He knew what he had heard, pausing as he had in the damp cellar when footsteps fanned out over his head. He had stood still for a long moment, feeling the same chill that prickled along his skin now, as he had tried to make sense of the movements from beneath. After the final bang of the back door he unmistakably heard the quiet, firm sound of a window being closed above his head. 

But if Anne hadn’t closed the kitchen window along with the back door… 

“I don’t understand,” Jerry’s dark brows darkened his eyes as he peered into Anne’s face. 

“Neither do I.” Anne’s gaze turned piercing then, and Jerry found he could no longer meet her eyes with his. “Jerry, is everything alright?” Anne cocked her head to the side, then shook it roughly. “Well, of course it’s not. What I mean to say is, is there something else?” 

Jerry’s eyes snapped up to meet Anne’s, and in an instant she knew that there was more than the horror of the evening haunting her friend. 

“Anne, Mrs. Lynde… she was... she has been…  _ comment dit-on _ … she is  _ mail-blacking _ someone.” Jerry’s voice was rushed and quiet, and Anne leaned toward him on the balls of her feet to hear him better. Her eyebrows were drawn low in confusion by the time he had finished, and she struggled to recall his words, hoping they would make sense on recollection. 

“What’s going on here?” Anne and Jerry leapt apart, both of their eyes blown wide and hearts battering against their ribs as the speaker’s voice rang out, too-loud in the close space, instantly quieting the other murmured conversations nearby. 

Muriel Stacey stood, pale and quivering, with her hands sternly upon her hips and fire burning in her eyes. Anne had not seen her look so moved to anger since they had happened upon their schoolhouse razed to the ground years previously. The sight of her former teacher’s composure upset caused Anne’s stomach to flip over inside of her, the wriggling combination of shock and guilt having no outlet within her. 

“Mrs. St-- Muriel? What happened?” Anne floundered, taking a tentative step toward her. 

“It appears, Miss Shirley, that your  _ farmhand _ here was about to tell you clandestine information that  _ is not his to tell _ . Isn’t that right, Monsieur Baynard?” Her eyes blazed with indignant fury as they held Jerry’s, whose expression had gone from timid to confused to thunderstruck in the course of a few quickened heartbeats. 

“N-- no, no! I was not--” Jerry stammered, both hands thrown out in front of him in a bid for absolution. 

“If my business is to be bandied about town, I would much prefer to tell it, if that’s not too much trouble,” Muriel’s face had turned an aggrieved, splotchy red. 

“Mister Baynard overheard a  _ private _ conversation earlier this week between Mrs. Lynde and myself. The former had come to my home on an errand for Matthew just as the latter was leaving. I’m not sure how much he heard, but as our - erm -  _ discussion  _ ended rather loudly… and on my front porch steps… with me calling out that she dare not darken my doorway again… well, I can only assume that Jerry was hoping to give some kind of testimony to my having some kind of motive in this horrific turn of events.” 

Muriel turned her back on the dumbstruck boy then, addressing the rest of the room as she pulled back her shoulders and clasped her shaking hands in front of her. 

“On this particular day Mrs. Lynde had come to my home  _ uninvited  _ and  _ unannounced  _ once more to attempt to set me up with her diminutive son, Caleb. After many niceties, on my part, and less than subtle barbs about my propriety, reputation, and the  _ shelf life  _ of my good looks and health on hers,” here Muriel sneered, reciting the distasteful comments as though they had been ringing ceaselessly in her ears since the visit in question, “I had had quite enough. I rose from my seat and told her in no uncertain terms that I was not interested in her lilliputian spawn, nor would I ever be. I may have lost my temper a bit… quite a bit… but the worst I did to that woman was to put my finger in  _ her _ smug, odious face  _ for once _ \--” 

The back porch of the house gave a loud, low creak here, startling the group as gasps and flinches broke the tension that had filled the frozen occupants of Green Gables’ sitting room. Muriel broke off, placing one hand across her heart and the other across her stomach, as though she could rein in the anger and hurt that had shaken apart her composure. After a few deep breaths, she pressed her lips together and locked her eyes on Bash, who was sitting on the edge of his seat, as though ready to spring into action to defend or conceal her - whichever she may need as this room of friends bore witness to her unbridled fury. 

After she caught her breath, Muriel’s lips curled slightly at the ends into a shaky, tight-lipped smile, her eyes holding Sebastian’s steady gaze. He gave her an imperceptible nod, and her shoulders shook with the force of her exhale, her expression growing warmer. 

“I finally stood my ground and told Mrs. Lynde, in no uncertain terms, that I did not require her matchmaking services because I had already fallen in love with the best man on all of Prince Edward Island, and I let her know that she need not darken my doorway  _ ever again _ .” As she spoke, her eyes filled with tears that spilled over, running in two thin, straight lines down her pale cheeks. She blinked them away quickly, her eyes locked with Bash’s. 

Had Muriel broken their stare she might have seen Diana’s cheeks dampen with tears or Gilbert’s slow, satisfied smile or Marilla’s eyes flit between her and Sebastian with dawning realization. As it was, she witnessed only the warm glow of love and belonging within the depths of Sebastian’s unwavering gaze. Her shaking ceased and her anger abated as she stood a moment and let herself revel in this feeling of being known and seen and unafraid at last. 

Jerry cleared his throat quietly behind her, and Muriel jumped slightly, jolted from the moment. “Then Mrs. Lynde said, ‘I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that --  _ for your sake _ . As well as for your  _ beloved’s _ .” Jerry emphasized the words as Rachel had, though he managed to strip away the disgust with which she had said the words, leaving behind only the threat implied therein. 

Muriel’s chin jutted out, her proud comportment belying the fear and loathing she had experienced in that moment with her purportedly nurturing neighbor. 

The room was silent for another brief moment before Bash leapt to his feet, turning to point a finger directly into the face of the still-sniffling Diana Barry and announcing in a clear voice, “Well if truth be told you should know that Muriel was not the only one threatenin’ Mrs. Lynde, then. No, not by a long shot.” His dark eyes were wild again, though he couldn’t meet Diana’s startled glare. “The other day, on my way to go fishin’, I cut through Willowmere and I--” 

“I’m sorry, you  _ what _ ?” Marilla’s sharp voice cut through Sebastian’s, and he turned toward her with his finger still held aloft, accusing the room at large. 

“I was gone fishing?” Bash asked tentatively. 

“Yes, thank you, Sebastian. I  _ do  _ know what fishing is. I was curious about that…  _ other _ thing that you said. What had you cut out for this fishing expedition? And do you mind putting that finger away before you jab someone’s eye out with it?” Marilla raised a stern eyebrow at him, her tone arch as she crossed her arms over her chest. 

“I-- uhh… Sorry about that, Ms. Cuthbert.” Bash looked appropriately abashed, ducking his head as he retracted first his inculpatory digit and then his extended arm, dropping both to rest beside him. “I cut through… Willowmere?” he finished uncertainly, turning to catch Anne’s eye. “Isn’t that what you call that old patch of willows alongside the Barry farm?”

“Of  _ course _ . You remember it, Marilla! I told you about it ages ago. I got that name out of the book Diana lent me when we were children. Oh, that was a thrilling book. The heroine had _ five lovers _ and--” 

Marilla cut off Anne before she could get carried away in her explanation, something about the speech the girl was brewing giving Marilla a distinct case of deja vu -- as well as the imminent threat of a headache directly behind her left eye. 

“Yes, yes. Very well. Continue, Bash,” Marilla gestured toward him, praying internally for a quick resolution to the sudden confessional scene she found herself thrown into as another blaze of lightning fleetingly lit the front windows. 

“Well, I was walkin’ past the Barry homestead when I heard angry voices. I come closer to announce myself when I saw through the trees Mrs. Lynde pointin’ her finger straight into young Ms. Barry’s chest. She was red as a ripe apple and pokin’ her, sayin’, ‘Maybe I’ll just pay a visit to your parents to see what they have to say about you runnin’ away with a poor, simple farmhand, shall I?’ Tryin’ to scare the girl, she was. Real menacin’. But before I could step out to lend a hand, young Ms. Barry rose up to her full height and went toe to toe with the ol’ lady. Said that Mrs. Lynde would  _ mind her own business if she knew what was good for her _ . She looked fit to rage, all wild eyes and bared teeth.” Bash leaned back, placing his hands in his pockets before continuing. 

“When I saw that, I turned and left the way I came.” 

Bash’s eyes looked worn, tinged with desperation as though the edges of his fraying composure had unraveled along with his tale. He seemed unsure whether he had done the right thing in speaking up, but it was also clear to all who knew him that he would say much worse to turn the spotlight of suspicion onto another member of the party. Muriel Stacey was not the only person in this room with a grudge against the meddling old woman. 

As all eyes had turned from Bash’s face to Diana’s, the girl began to cry in earnest. Tears poured from her eyes before she dropped her face into her hands and her body began to quake with sobs. For a moment, no one moved. Then, just as Anne reached forward, moving toward her friend as though tugged by an invisible string tied between their two aching hearts, Diana stood erect in a violent flash of motion. Her hands dropped from her face to ball into fists at her sides, revealing the same feral mask Bash had described moments before. Her teeth were bared as she spoke, and, across the room from her, Gilbert shuddered, having a perfect recollection of the one other time he had seen Diana this way. 

“She threatened me.” Her limbs shook, but her voice was clear and steady. “Made me promise to break off my engagement to Jerry. I don’t know how…  _ how  _ she found out about us. About our--” Her shoulders shook in one violent ripple, and then she threw them back and soldiered on, though her breath was coming in heaving gulps.

“We were going to elope--” Here several gasps could be heard around the small parlour. “--run away to Carmody to get married next week.” Diana’s whole body was quivering, but it was clear from her bearing - her dry cheeks and flinty gaze - that it was rage, not regret, fueling the motion. The wind bellowed against the house, seeming to shake the very foundations as every gaze locked on Diana’s quaking frame. 

“I promised her we wouldn’t. Swore that I would break things off for good. Permanently.” Jerry’s quiet intake of air seemed to hit Diana square in the chest, as though it were a bullet and not a breath - and her eyes met his across the room. 

Her voice started quietly, placatingly, but grew in volume as she quickly continued. “But I never meant it. Not a single word.”

Another gust howled through the walls and down the chimney as Jerry closed his eyes, his head bowing under the weight of Diana’s assurances. As she watched him shrink, Diana seemed to grow once more, her chest heaving breath, teeth bared and white, as she spit her final declaration through the still air of Green Gables’ sitting room.

“Rachel Lynde was the most meddlesome, disgusting, _cruel_ creature I have ever met, and I, for one, am _not sorry_ _that she is gone_.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Helloooooo I have missed this space so, so much.   
> I'm not sure what the state of the fandom is - of late I can barely keep tabs on the state of the world, not to mention my own small goings-on - but I *do* know that I am an Anne-girl always and forever, I have missed you all, and, most of all, I am going to finally finish this story -- and in the appropriate season for such a tale, too! Yay!   
> Please accept my apologies for being MIA, and my well-wishes for each of you. xoxo  
> -M


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Gilbert, what happened?” Jerry’s shaking seemed to bring Gilbert back to himself, but instead of meeting Jerry’s eyes, he turned to meet Anne’s terror-struck gaze. 
> 
> Gilbert’s mouth closed, jaw hardening in lines of determination, steel entering his gaze as he turned his attention to Jerry. 
> 
> “We have to go after him. Have to split up,” Gilbert shouted though his face was inches from Jerry’s. The wind carried his words to the others in the room, the sound of it distorted as it flew past straining ears. 
> 
> [](https://www.flickr.com/photos/187975673@N07/49839655662/in/dateposted-public/)  
> 

Lightning flashed through the silent room, its occupants still and wide-eyed in the wake of Diana’s brutal exclamation. A shiver seemed to ripple across the room as - several long, speechless seconds later - a crack of thunder jolted the room’s occupants from their statue-stillness. 

All at once, they stirred. 

Marilla took a step away from Diana, moving a shaking hand to cover her mouth, head shaking in a slow denial with her eyes shut tight. Anne and Jerry both jolted forward, arms outstretched, to comfort or subdue, whichever would better protect their beloved Diana from the consequences of her honesty. Sebastian turned his back to the room to face the dark, blank front window, turning from one storm to another as the wind violently shook the trees and roared against the flimsy barrier between the room’s occupants and the brutal chaos of Mother Nature without. Gilbert took his turn to pace toward the still-cold fireplace, Matthew’s old shirt stretched tight across his broad back as he moved to place his hands upon the mantle. For her part, Muriel sat as though she was a marionette whose strings had been cut, going from standing to flopping in the closest armchair, her body limp and drained. 

Only Diana did not move, frozen with wide eyes and heaving breast. She didn’t react to the comforting hands that rested upon her cheeks (Anne’s) and the hand squeezing hers (Jerry’s), nor to the murmured words of comfort which she did not hear, her own ears still ringing with the ferocious wave of feeling that had consumed her. 

A moment later, Marilla’s cold voice rang across the room. 

“Is there anyone here who  _ wasn’t _ being blackmailed, threatened, or otherwise  _ harassed _ by Rachel Lynde?” Her angry voice punched at the words until it caught and quivered in the end on her friend’s name, but her posture remained rigid, eyes shrewd as she surveyed the room. No one moved, and then, one by one the party-goers eyed one another. Then, heads began to slowly shake. 

After another silent moment, Jerry drew in a deep breath, pressing his lips together as the precursor to his making an announcement, but simultaneously the image of Rachel Lynde’s pale corpse seated at the table had forced its way past the blank, red-tinged buzz in Diana’s mind, and the bright, electric anger left her in an instant. 

And then, she broke.

Diana was not a puppet with cut strings. She was a scoop of ice cream dropped upon porch steps in July heat. She melted to the ground for the second time that evening, weak and bloodless and shaking violently. Jerry and Anne both shouted her name, moving to attempt to cushion her sudden liquefaction to the floor. 

Gilbert moved with purpose toward Diana, too, asking the room at large for a candle as he cupped a hand around her lolling neck and looked into her pupils, taking in the waxen appearance of her cheeks and listless look in her eyes. 

After a brief moment he announced, “She’s going into shock. Jerry, help me - she needs to rest.” 

The two men hoisted the limp form between them and began the slow climb up the stairs of Green Gables. After laying her flat on her back in Anne’s bed, Gilbert sought out blankets and towels from the chest at the end of Anne’s bed, then he asked Jerry to lift her legs at the knees, and Gilbert slid his stack beneath them, elevating her still-slippered feet. Jerry reached out to tenderly remove her shoes and socks before the two young men drew Anne’s quilt tight around her shivering form, her pale, sweat-glistened face turned toward the wall, blank eyes staring. 

Jerry’s brow was furrowed into deep lines of worry, his eyes raking over Diana from head to toe and back again, looking for injury or danger or anything he could possibly do to make her more comfortable. Gilbert’s heart twinged at the sight, easily placing himself in his friend’s shoes, and suddenly in a rush to get back downstairs, to keep Anne close at his side, to protect her from any further horrors, real or imagined, that this night may have in store. 

“Keep close by. Don’t let her roll onto her side, and be ready with a vessel in case she needs to be sick. Here-” Gilbert reached over to Anne’s dressing table and handed Jerry her washing basin. “If she begins to seize or her lips begin to turn blue, shout for me.” Gilbert used his most calm, doctorly voice to address the young man, whose eyes went more wide with fear with each word. 

Gilbert reached out to clap a reassuring hand on Jerry’s arm, squeezing him once, and assuring, “She’ll be alright, Jerry. I’m sure of it.” 

If his words didn’t feel entirely truthful, at least it was in the service of a friend.

As Gilbert hurried back downstairs, he heard a fierce gust of wind burst down the chimney, feeling its chill sweep across the room as he continued his stride until he reached Anne’s side, discreetly taking her hand in his and giving her a tight squeeze. 

She turned to face him, eyes bright with unshed tears and pale lips quivering with worry. Gilbert’s eyes caught on her lips for a moment too long, a vision of kissing color and vibrancy back into them racing through his mind before he dragged his eyes back up to hers, his thoughts swinging erratically before her words sunk in. 

“She’s alright. Jerry is with her. She is sleeping now.” Gilbert couldn’t fully answer Anne’s question -  _ Will Diana be alright? _ \- with confidence, but Anne didn’t seem to notice. 

A throat cleared loudly beside him, and Gilbert turned to realize belatedly that he had stepped between Marilla and Anne, who must have been the ones conversing as Bash and Muriel had scarcely moved from their previous positions. 

“I was just asking Anne exactly what Rachel had been holding over her head, but she assures me that I don’t need to know. Would you care to enlighten me, Gilbert? It would seem that I can fill in the details - even given my  _ limited imagination _ \- for Rachel’s dealings with the rest of your party here, but I cannot  _ imagine  _ what she could be holding over Anne’s head. Or  _ yours _ , for that matter…” 

Marilla’s eyes narrowed at Gilbert, and then bounced back and forth between his face and Anne’s, whose countenance turned defiant. Anne squeezed Gilbert’s hand at her side as though it were a lifeline, but her posture didn’t change. She kept her gaze firmly locked on Marilla’s as it came to rest on hers, and the stubborn girl lifted her chin an inch as she cooly replied, “As I said, it is of little import.” 

_ A dark coat closet, the distant clamor of the party far beneath and the soft, sweet sounds of Anne coming apart against his ear, watching as his panting breaths caused gooseflesh to spread across her pale neck, and then, suddenly, turning to find the ugly, supercilious, gloating face of Rachel Lynde haloed by a deluge of light and sound from behind her.  _

All of it came rushing back to Gilbert in an instant. Somehow, instead of shame or anger, this time the recollection brought him nothing but a grim satisfaction, and he had to bite down on a smug smirk before it could spread across his face, revealing his pitiless heart and the way that it beat only for Anne. He wondered if she felt the same way as he did in that moment, and the urge to smooth his thumb over the back of her hand - a reminder of his caress, of the way that he made her shiver with pleasure under his touch, of his promise for a future free from the vile threats of that vile woman - and draw her into his arms. He furrowed his brow in concentration, willing his face into form before it could alert Marilla to the direction of his thoughts. 

“Hmph,” was the only reply Marilla gave, her eyes still scrutinizing the young couple. Then she moved to sit on the chaise, her eyes closing in a brief show of exhaustion. 

“Marilla, perhaps we should go to bed. I’m not sure what more we can do tonight, with the storm and Diana and… well, I believe our minds can work better on this problem in the light of day. Tomorrow the constable will have returned, and the storm passed, and we will be able to hunt out exactly what happened. Perhaps find the rock she fell on or…” Anne realized that her voice sounded high, strung tightly on the fiction she was weaving in an attempt to get Marilla to accede to rest, or perhaps just her desire to put off the horrors of this night for some future Anne, who would surely be better equipped to deal with them. 

Marilla’s eyes snapped open, her reply harsh. “ _ We both know that Rachel didn’t fall on a rock somewhere, Anne. _ People who die in accidents like that don’t usually wind up  _ seated at my breakfast table _ , now, do they?” 

Anne, generally well-used to Marilla’s acerbic tongue, bristled at her scathing tone, and her patience, worn and stretched from attacks on all fronts, snapped.    
  


“No, I suppose not. So, shall I confess to having  _ brained _ Mrs. Lynde with the  _ clothes iron _ just to get you into bed, or shall we wait until you succumb to shock and have to be carried up to bed, too,  _ mother dearest _ ?” 

The room rang with the second caustic, shouted speech of the past half hour, and it felt as though no one moved, not even to draw breath, as the echoed cry of Anne’s exhausted petulance bounced from wall to wall. 

Then Marilla drew herself up to her full height, eyes blazing and lungs filling for what surely would have started a screaming match worthy of top-price tickets and a bag of popcorn, when quiet words interrupted her, dousing the room into a chilling silence. 

From his position at Green Gables’ front window, his back still stiffly facing the sitting room, Bash declared in a clear, ringing voice. 

“There’s a girl in the garden.” 

*****

Bash was gone. 

The front door of Green Gables banged loudly against the wall behind it, the windows rattling in their panes, as Bash took off wildly into the night, leaving behind a room thrown into chaos. 

Muriel stood, shouting his name, and raced toward the door, only to be held back by Gilbert, who had lunged forward, also calling out to his brother’s disappearing form. Anne stood rooted to the spot, her mouth agape, while Marilla rushed toward the place Bash had been standing only seconds before. An invisible new guest at the party, given access once more by broken barriers to its insistent knocking, forcefully entered through the open door, bringing with it a vortex of rain-soaked leaves and a roar of triumphant fury. 

Jerry came careening down the stairs then, his eyes wild with terror. Gilbert turned when Jerry spun him in place, yelling into the wall of noise pouring in from behind the young doctor. 

“ _ What has happened? Where is Bash? _ ” 

Gilbert blinked, his face stunned, eyes unfocused and mouth ajar. Jerry, his hands still on Gilbert’s shoulders, shook him violently. 

“Gilbert,  _ what happened _ ?” Jerry’s shaking seemed to bring Gilbert back to himself, but instead of meeting Jerry’s eyes, he turned to meet Anne’s terror-struck gaze. 

Gilbert’s mouth closed, jaw hardening in lines of determination, steel entering his gaze as he turned his attention to Jerry. 

“We have to go after him. Have to split up,” Gilbert shouted though his face was inches from Jerry’s. The wind carried his words to the others in the room, the sound of it distorted as it flew past straining ears. 

Anne, Marilla, and Muriel hurried toward the two men standing in the doorway, fighting against the press of the invading gale, which had yet to tire in its relentless advance. 

Each of them spoke on top of the other, their voices pitched high and loud. 

“But… but Diana--” Jerry eyes lingered on the staircase. 

“We have to stop him before--” Muriel’s gaze was fixed out of the open door. 

“Oh no you don’t, not in all of this--” Marilla puffed her chest out, ready to bodily block the door if necessary. 

“I can go and find him if you’ll just--” Anne looked stubborn, turning toward the coat closet, where her boots awaited her. 

“Wait!” Gilbert’s deep voice rang out loudly, the look in his eyes pleaded with each of the room’s occupants. He turned to close the door behind him, the wind taking one last swipe at his curls, leaving a frazzled nest behind as Gilbert fought against its intrusion, finally closing the door with an almighty shove of his shoulder. 

He turned to face the room once more. “Wait, we must hurry, but we cannot go out there alone.” 

“But Bash--” Muriel lunged forward, her eyes shining, the hair from her low bun pulled out to frame her face in a wind-tossed halo. “I must go out to--” 

“No.” Gilbert looked back at her stubbornly, the wildness in her eyes echoed in his own. “You cannot go out in that gale all alone. Jerry--” He turned to face the younger man, who had taken a step toward the stairs as though he were being pulled back to Diana by a flaxen cord. “You must go with Ms. Stacy.” 

The panic-stricken boy was shaking his head before Gilbert had finished speaking, so the young doctor put a reassuring hand on his arm and squeezed. 

“Don’t worry - Marilla will go upstairs to sit with Diana. Won’t you, Marilla?” Here he turned toward the exhausted matriarch, who looked as though she were about to collapse once more. 

“You’ll take care of her? Make sure she is well?” Gilbert’s eyes spoke volumes as he urged Marilla into decisive action, hoping that her usual brusque determination would allay Jerry’s fear of leaving Diana’s side. 

“Of course.” Marilla’s curt nod and the stern set of her mouth brooked no argument on the subject, as usual, and Jerry’s shoulders slumped, partly in relief, and partly in dread. 

“I’ll get our coats.” His dejection was clear, but Muriel seemed as though she could not hear him, could not be bothered by the proceedings of the last minute. 

Marilla turned to slowly trudge up the stairs, her skirts in her hands. Anne watched her go, feeling her heart ache with each beat as she noted the exhaustion that was clear on every line and angle of her mother’s frame. 

With Jerry and Muriel’s backs to them, Gilbert stepped swiftly forward, grasping both of Anne’s deathly-cold hands in his. He brought their backs to his lips - a gesture as familiar as it was thrilling to them both, even now - and kissed her gently. She met his deep brown eyes with her own steady gaze, and nodded her head. 

“Let’s go.”

*****

Even covered in the overly-large oilskin, Muriel felt the frigid wind whip straight through her skirts and skin - it seemed to lick at her very bones with each angry gust. She shivered, but pressed forward determinedly, the young farmhand at her side holding aloft a lit lantern, the flame fighting against going out and flaring at the excess of oxygen in turns, giving each step they took a strange, flickering pulse. 

They headed straight toward the small, fenced garden plot to the side of Green Gables where Matthew grew his prized root vegetables in the spring and summer. The light they held was only strong enough to light each step in front of them, the full moon above obscured by banks of clouds moving between heaven and earth. The entire world around them seemed to have a heartbeat, and, between glimpses of the moon and distant flares of lightning, its throbbing flashes of light were out of sync with the hurried steps the duo took to reach Sebastian and the short, fierce blasts of wind that whipped past their ears. 

But the garden plot was grey and empty, Bash nowhere to be found. 

Muriel hurried into the enclosure, leaving the safety of Jerry’s proffered elbow and small ring of lantern light. She only stopped once she was in the dead center of the sleeping plot of land, already put to bed for the oncoming winter. Her chest was heaving with anxiety, and every time she blinked her eyes against the wind she saw Bash, motionless and staring as Rachel Lynde had been, blood seeping from the back of his head as a shadowed figure crept away from him into the darkness. She had seen hatred and murder in the eyes of men before, especially recently as her excursions with Sebastian had become more frequent, her laughter at his quiet witticisms, murmured against her ear as he escorted her to the town square or on an evening stroll, more boisterous. 

It took very little for her to imagine the kind of man who would take advantage of the chaos of this evening - a blackout storm and one victim already under his belt - to take care of another  _ problem _ in peaceful little Avonlea. Muriel shuddered again, her arms coming around her own elbows, trying to hold herself together against an encroaching tenebrosity that seemed bent on tearing her apart. 

When Jerry called out right next to her, shouting to be heard over the gale, she nearly went to pieces right there, jumping a foot into the air in surprise. 

“This shovel, look.” His voice was loud but monotone, somehow. Emotionless.

Muriel’s feet carried her to the boy without conscious thought, her mind still amalgamated with hell, her darkest fears taking up too much room for reason or reality at the moment. He held out something to her in the darkness, his face as expressionless as his tone. 

“This was not here before. I put it in the barn this afternoon. And there,” Jerry held the long-handled shovel in his hand, turning the wide, pointed spade over so the convex side faced them. Its rusted metal was darkened by something black and viscous. As Jerry brought the lantern closer, the liquid turned slightly less opaque, flashing red in the flare of light. 

“It’s…” Jerry was studying the shovel closely, though his mind seemed miles away. 

“Blood.” Muriel finished his thought, and her heart pounded in her chest as though it felt the spillage as if it were her own, and it was prepared to fight to protect its own store of the precious fluid. 

They both stared down at the shovel in silence as the storm whirled about them, their oilskins and hair whipping in the gale. 

A movement out of the corner of Jerry’s eye caused him to snap his head to the left, peering through the intermittent darkness back toward Green Gables. As he watched, a shadow crept around the side of the house, heading toward the back porch. 

“Look!” he gestured with the hand holding the lantern, dropping the shovel and reaching for Muriel’s hand simultaneously. In an instant they were racing back toward the house. Muriel was silent, which Jerry took as a sign that she had seen the same thing as him. 

They rounded the far corner of the house just as the floor-level window of Matthew’s bedroom slid shut behind the intruder with a soft  _ thud _ . 

*****

Anne held tightly to Gilbert’s hand as they went out of the back door of Green Gables, stepping off of the shallow back porch, down its few steps, and into the full force of the cyclone of wind and debris and darkness. Gilbert was clearly heading toward the tall barn doors, Anne half a step behind him, squinting her eyes against the squall. 

She had run this very course so many hundreds of times in the last eight years - galloping off to tell Matthew exciting news or ask his advice; running at full-speed to hide from Marilla or beasts and phantoms of her imagination; meandering along, humming to herself as she went, feet bare and eyes closed, off to feed Belle or lay in the hay and count knotholes and dream and dream and dream. 

This time the path, its dips and divots familiar to her even in the maylay and darkness, felt a stranger somehow, and her neck erupted in goose pimples that had nothing to do with the clawing fingers of wind that tugged and tore at her as she went, barely keeping pace with Gilbert’s long strides. 

In another moment they had reached the relative safety of the barn, Gilbert turning to shut the door firmly behind them. The barn was dark and restless, the wisps of wind struggling through the rough walls, the animals inside restless. Gilbert held aloft his lantern and went to work, peeking in every enclosure and shadowed crevice, the lantern light glowing warmly, casting out the penumbra of each gate and milk bottle. They found no one on the main floor, and Gilbert doggedly headed toward the loft ladder, only letting go of Anne’s hand when he pulled her to the foot of it and pressed her against it.

“We have to check the hay above, Anne-girl. Do you want to stay here while I go up and look?” He murmured this against her neck, having pressed his body close to hers, her back against the rungs of the ladder and her heart racing. 

“No, no…” Anne’s voice came out breathless and quiet, and she turned quickly to begin her ascent before Gilbert could drive their reason for being here out of her mind entirely. She heard him climb the ladder behind her, the lantern still held aloft in one of his hands. 

When they reached the top, Gilbert put his arms around Anne, nipping at the spot where her neck met her shoulder lightly, as he reached for the pitchfork stuck into the loose hay lining the floor. He turned from her then, and began spearing the fork mercilessly into the hay every few feet. Anne’s heart stuttered when she realized what he was doing - looking for hidden parties without having to turn the dried grass over. 

He was finished before she could find the words to object -  _ he could truly hurt someone!  _ \- and was back beside her in another instant. She didn’t realize that she was up against the frame of the barn roof until her back hit it gently as she stepped back from his looming figure. He reached around her to lean the pitchfork against the wall that was supporting her weight. Her breath stuttered on its way out as his lips found her neck again, pressing slow, open-mouthed kisses down the column of her throat and across her collarbones. He wrapped his free arm around her waist, his hand cupping her ribcage on the opposite side, ensnaring her in a vice grip, pulling her torso flush with his. 

“Anne,” his voice was quiet and breathless against her clavicle, the fingers on his hand spreading across her ribcage to brush the underside of her breast. 

She whimpered in reply, her mind going blissfully blank, her body feeling boneless, pinned as it was between the firm expanse of wall behind and Gilbert ahead. His lips worked up to the other side of her neck, and he had just laved a hot, wet stripe of his tongue across the tendon in her neck, stretched tight as she angled her head back to give him better access, when he froze suddenly, his whole body going taut, his grip on her waist turning painful. 

“G-- Gil, what--” Anne started to squirm in his grip, when he released her, pressing her gently to the side and reaching behind her, toward the wall. Before she could get her question out, he had held the lantern aloft with one hand, and plucked a small, white bundle out of a particularly large knothole in the corner of the wooden framing. 

He turned to face Anne, the light held up still, and offered her the bundle. Anne took it from him with no small amount of trepidation, the hidden cache not familiar to her. Before she could unwrap it fully, her fingers found the coarse stitching of embroidery in the corner, and she knew instantly that she was holding the handkerchief that Diana had gifted Jerry years before - the first token of her forbidden love for the boy. 

Anne took a steadying breath as the cloth fell the rest of the way open, revealing a piece of paper folded compactly and a golden pocket watch. She lifted both items from the kerchief, pocketing the small square of fabric, and decided to inspect the watch first. It was foreign to her - she had never known Jerry to carry so fine a timepiece. She assumed it, too, had been a gift from Diana -- perhaps one that he was too worried about damaging to carry with him in his daily labors? But then the lantern light glinted off of a significant divot in the top of the watch’s casing, and Anne’s brow furrowed. She opened the cover of the watch to find that the time on it had stopped, though the glass on the watch face was still intact. Anne was about to close the cover and inspect the paper next when her eyes caught on a small engraving on the inside of the metallic watch cover. 

Anne read the inscription aloud, squinting in the dim lighting to try to make the words out, her pronunciation of the foreign language choppy. 

“Kehre bald zu uns zurück, mein Geliebter.” 

Anne met Gilbert’s eyes, and found his brow furrowed, too. “Perhaps the note explains it?” Gilbert ventured, his eyes darting back down to the folded paper in Anne’s hand. 

She closed and pocketed the watch, too, then unfolded the note quickly, shivering as a particularly loud peal of thunder seemed to shake the walls around them. She read the message on the note aloud, too, the fluid script familiar to her, even in the darkness. 

_ Mr. Baynard,  _

_ After carefully considering all that you revealed yesterday, I have decided not to approach Marilla and Matthew with the abundance of evidence I have obtained of your high-handed treachery and deceit. Not yet, at least.  _

_ Meet me at the dock on Barry’s pond tonight at midnight, and I will give you one last chance to save your own skin. I see no need to make threats about your name, your livelihood, or your chances of ever getting away with your audacious plans with the foolish Barry girl should you stand me up.  _

_ Don’t be late.  _

_ RL _

Anne raised her eyes from the letter, her hands trembling, to look into Gilbert’s shocked face. Lightning struck nearby, causing both of them to jump, and thawing them from their stupefaction. 

“Jerry,” Anne whispered, the name sounding synonymous with the word  _ no _ , a refusal to believe the evidence still grasped in her hands. Gilbert reached toward her, and she thought he would embrace her, make this nightmare disappear. 

Instead, he reached his hand into Jerry’s hiding place, blindly searching with his fingers, and coming out with one last item. 

Anne did not need the flickering flame of the lantern to see the item Gilbert brought forward, as another bolt of lightning flashed outside, rumbling through her bones as her whole body went cold. Gilbert held out his open palm to reveal the small, tarnished item that had been tucked at the bottom of Jerry’s horde. 

The revolver flashed in the levin shaft, the boom of thunder that followed thereafter resonating like a gunshot through Anne’s ringing ears. 

*****

His chest was heaving, his breath coming in awful, gasping gulps. He felt the places he would be bruised and sore in the days to come, having tripped in the darkness more than once, chasing phantoms. He stared wildly around himself in the darkness, waiting for his eyes to adjust so he could get his bearings before he continued his search. 

His mind was moving as fast as it could, whirling through possibilities and probabilities. Never did it catalog the danger he had put himself in, running off into the dark night when the whole of the house was on the hunt for a murderer. Not even pausing to realize it when he thought the word for the first time that evening:  _ murderer _ . 

The darkness surrounding him began to coalesce into the shapes, and he held his arms out in front of him as he stumbled forward, his breath hitching as he made out the dark shapes of the bed next to him, and remembered what lay there. 

He wandered into corners of the room, feeling his way along the wall for a body as he went. When he found the edges of the room empty, his eyesight improving all the while, he dropped to his knees and looked under the bed. He had played the game of chase to this point. He would have seen if the shadow had taken off for the barn, or the line of trees on the far edge of the property.

No one was there. 

No one, aside from the corpse on the bed above him. 

He stood then, towering over the prone form of Rachel Lynde, both of them unblinking and unmoving. After a long moment, he sat beside her on the bed, reaching out to place his hand over the woman’s, patting her in a placating fashion. He could never say why he did it, except that maybe, in the end, he felt sorry for the meddlesome woman. Maybe. Just a little. 

The pressure of his hand on hers felt odd, though. Not because her skin was firm and still and cold as ice; his soft and overheated, pulsing with life. Instead it seemed as though her hand were resting on a cushion, instead of against her side. He reached beneath the hand, wondering if her skirts had been lifted in the transferral of her body, remembering how careful they had been in transferring her to this temporary resting place. 

He felt along her apron, then the waist of her dress, looking for an explanation. There, tucked into the waist of her apron in a neat square, he found a wide swath of fabric. He pulled it out, holding it to the thin stream of moonlight coming in the window. 

And then the door burst open, flooding light onto the scene, once more leaving Bash blind, waiting for his eyes to adjust. 

*****

“I have the map, now please,  _ please _ , just let me go. I’ll give it to you - give you anything you want. But, please.  _ I want to go home. _ ” 

Marilla mopped the brow of the girl, pleading with an invisible foe, her eyes shut tight. 

“Shhh now. Hush, it's just a nightmare, Diana. You’re at Green Gables. You’re safe.” 

The frightened dreamer paid her no mind, tossing and turning her head as she lay flat on her back as though she were tied to the bed that way. 

“Take it - it’s in my pocket. Just take it and let us go.  _ Please! _ ” Her plea turned to a sob, and her shoulders shook with a sob. 

“Okay, Diana. Okay, I’ll take the map and you may go. You are free. There,” Marilla was at her wits end. Never before had she played along with one of Anne’s fanciful games of pirates or knights or fairy queens, but she was desperate to soothe the frightened girl before her. She even made a show of putting her hands into her pockets and drawing out…

A folded piece of paper. 

“Th-- there. I’ve got the map, Diana. Now rest. You’re free.” Marilla murmured to the girl, who took a deep breath and then relaxed, seeming to melt back into the pillow and fall deeply asleep once more. 

Marilla’s shoulders relaxed in response to the peaceful repose of Diana, and she gently stood from the edge of the bed and crossed to the window of Anne’s room. Standing with her back to the bed, Marilla unfolded the parchment and brought it close to her face. She recognized the writing on the page, but could not quite make out what she was looking at. The only word her brain supplied as she squinted in the dim moonlight was  _ map _ . 

She held the paper so close to her nose that she did not notice the shadows moving across the lawn beneath her, the howling wind covering the cries that rose up in the night. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yoooooo i didn't finish this by Halloween, but Charles Dickens called and told me that it's the Spooky Season from October to January so I STILL HAVE TIME OKAYYYY  
> *nervous chuckle*  
> one chapter to go - i'm loving your predictions almost as much as I'm loving writing 24/7 Horndt Gilbert. xoxoxoxo
> 
> PS hmu if you caught the Shaun of the Dead reference I snuck in there :D


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